Research

Mixed

Regular exercise induces adverse metabolic responses (worsening of cardiovascular or diabetes risk factors) in approximately 8-13% of individuals, affecting fasting insulin, systolic blood pressure, triglycerides, and HDL-cholesterol.

If you have been exercising regularly and your blood pressure, cholesterol, or blood sugar markers are getting worse instead of better, do not stop exercising. This is a known phenomenon affecting about 1 in 10 people. Consult a healthcare provider or exercise physiologist to identify if you are an 'adverse responder' and adjust your exercise type or intensity, as standard protocols may not be optimal for your specific metabolic profile.

GoodQualifiesHIGH confidence
Using the above definitions, 126 subjects (8.4%) had an adverse change in FI. Numbers of adverse responders reached 12.2% for SBP, 10.4% for TG, and 13.3% for HDL-C.
Claude Bouchard et al. · PLoS ONE · 2012

Why this rating

The finding is based on a large pooled analysis (N=1,687) of six randomized controlled trials with rigorous definitions of adverse response (2x technical error).

Source

Adverse Metabolic Response to Regular Exercise: Is It a Rare or Common Occurrence?

Claude Bouchard et al. · PLoS ONE · 2012

DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0037887

cohort · n=1687Cited 379×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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