Issue link: https://viewer.e-digitaleditions.com/i/95079
insider CHEERS TO YOUR HEALTH Hallelujah and pass the popcorn! Science has finally uncovered some good news for a change: red wine is good for you and – get this bit – CAN EVEN REPLACE EXERCISE! Scientists in Canada found that resveratrol (a polyphenol) found in red wine can help exercise performance by improving strength and endurance. Boffins from the University of Alberta (a renowned wine-swilling cluster of carousers) discovered the compound improved physical performance, muscle strength and heart function. It also increased whole body metabolism. Plus – and this is the really exciting bit – it's ergogenic.* Research leader Jason Dyck reckoned his heart beat Journalist, novelist and public speaker Sue Webster is part of the third generation of a dairying family and director of a company that specialises in agricultural and financial writing. a little faster too. "We were excited when we saw that resveratrol showed results similar to what you would see from extensive endurance exercise," he said. Lay it on me, Jason! "I think resveratrol could help people who want to exercise but are physically incapable. Resveratrol could mimic exercise for them," he said. Couch potatoes of the world, rejoice! Be slothful and sink a skinful … it's good for you. Come on, Jason. Give me more! "We immediately saw potential in this and thought that we identified improved exercise performance in a pill," he said. (Clunk. Wheels suddenly fall off the Whoopmobile.) Pill? What's the pleasure in that? Where's the fun in swilling down a pill? A good drinking session and subsequent bad hangover have a long and ignoble tradition. What lies can be peddled, what fantasies explained, what bad jokes told and family secrets spilled without lubrication? What hearts can be stirred, broken and mended, what dreams forged and foundered, without several glasses of heart-starter? Where's the bibulous bonhomie in a mutual pill-pop? Where's the shazza-shazza-boom-boom in sharking down a tablet? But wait, it gets worse … Jason's work investigated the impacts of high-level resveratrol supplementation on exercise among laboratory rats. Rats? What use is a good red to a rodent? Since 2003 the scientific world has been all a-froth at the potential of resveratrol. It started when David Sinclair and a team from Harvard University discovered it prolonged the life of yeast cells. Gladdened geeks the world over sought the secrets of anti-ageing. They poured red wine into a variety of organisms such as fruit flies, nematode worms, fish and mice (none of them noted bon vivants). Around the world, science has created happily plastered lower life forms. Some of them are science experiments. Others I call my friends. Sometimes it's hard to differentiate. *No, I have no idea what that means either, but it sounds impressive. I feel healthier just by reading it. 87 Illu stration: ww.ji w og -r m ers.c o. u k