5,976 minutes...

To a sneeze-free you. Seattle investigators set out to see if regular exercise reduced not only the waistline, but also the risk of upper respiratory infections.

They invited 115 overweight old gals down to the gym to participate in a year's worth of supervised fitness activities. Half of this postmenopausal bunch were assigned to regular aerobic classes while the other half stretched and chatted.

At the end of nine months, the aerobic group had not met their goal of 45 minutes of hot sweaty work-outs at least five days per week. They had, however, managed to dance to the oldies for an average of 166 minutes throughout the time period.

So, 36 weeks X 166 minutes = 5,976 minutes of activity (I did NOT do that in my head, but neither did I use a calculator). In the final 3 months, some 6,000 minutes into this exercise adventure, the fitter group got 1/3 as many colds compared to the stretchy group.

I am here to tell you, the sniffly parade I saw today in the office apparently had not yet read this study.