Research

Hormonal

Six months of endurance training improves intrinsic muscle insulin sensitivity (glucose disposal per unit of fat-free mass) in nonobese young women, independent of changes in body composition or aerobic capacity.

If you are a young, healthy woman, doing endurance exercise three times a week for six months will improve your muscles' ability to use glucose. This happens because the exercise changes how the muscle itself processes sugar, not because you lost weight or got fitter in terms of VO2 max. You do not need to lose fat to get this specific metabolic benefit.

GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
On the other hand, endurance training enhances glucose disposal independent of changes in FFM or maximum aerobic capacity, suggestive of an intrinsic change in the muscle to metabolize glucose.
Éric T. Poehlman et al. · The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism · 2000

Why this rating

Randomized controlled trial with clamp methodology, limited to specific demographic.

Source

Effects of Resistance Training and Endurance Training on Insulin Sensitivity in Nonobese, Young Women: A Controlled Randomized Trial1

Éric T. Poehlman et al. · The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism · 2000

DOI 10.1210/jcem.85.7.6692

rct · n=51Cited 280×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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