Trump's Rumored Theory On Exercise Has People Talking. Here's What Experts Think.

At this point, it’s clear that President Donald Trump is a sleepy guy.

Earlier this week, Trump was caught dozing off while both Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner spoke during a Cabinet meeting.

It’s just the latest instance of the 79-year-old being photographed asleep on the job, a tendency that has led some, including Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.), to call him “Dozy Don.” 

But if the president is tired, it’s probably not because of his exercise regimen. Last week, Trump’s interesting take on exercise resurfaced on social media after The New York Times published a detailed report on Trump showing signs of aging and making fewer public appearances in his second term compared to the same point in his first term.

Sandwiched between details about Trump’s diet (he’s apparently a red meat guy and eats “McDonald’s by the sackful”) and his weight, the Times mentioned the rather interesting views he reportedly holds on physical activity:

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He does not get regular exercise, in part because he has a long-held theory that people are born with a finite amount of energy and that vigorous activity can deplete that reserve, like a battery.

It’s not the first time the media has reported this. In a 2017 profile on President Donald Trump in The New Yorker, writer Evan Osnos said Trump believes “a person, like a battery, is born with a finite amount of energy.”

While Trump has never explicitly stated this odd theory in his own words in public, sources say it’s a belief he’s held since he was a younger man. In the 2016 biography “Trump Revealed,” Washington Post reporters Michael Kranish and Marc Fisher write:

“After college, after Trump mostly gave up his personal athletic interests, he came to view time spent playing sports as time wasted. Trump believed the human body was like a battery, with a finite amount of energy, which exercise only depleted. So he didn’t work out. When he learned that John O’Donnell, one of his top casino executives, was training for an Ironman triathlon, he admonished him, ‘You are going to die young because of this.’”

What does Trump do for exercise? If you count golf, plenty of that. But he also seems to think that just standing around is all the workout you need. Here’s what he told The New York Times magazine in 2015:

“Trump said he was not following any special diet or exercise regimen for the campaign. ‘All my friends who work out all the time, they’re going for knee replacements, hip replacements – they’re a disaster,’ he said. He exerts himself fully by standing in front of an audience for an hour, as he just did. ‘That’s exercise.’”

Is it, though? It’s a big stretch, said Christine Persaud, a sports medicine physician at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University in Brooklyn, New York.

“Standing at a podium is better than sitting, but it does not strengthen the heart, muscles, or bones in the way that keeps people mobile and independent as they age,” Persaud said.

As for the claim that exercise depletes our energy reserves, as you probably could have guessed, that’s misguided, too.

“The idea that we are born with a fixed amount of energy that gets depleted by exercise like a battery does not match what we know in medicine,” Persaud told HuffPost.

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Regular physical activity is what makes the body better at producing and using energy. For instance, a 2014 study pooling together data from over 40,000 adults found that marathon runners had a 30% lower risk of death and a 45% lower risk of cardiovascular mortality compared with non-runners.

Frequent exercise actually results in living longer.

“Exercise increases mitochondrial efficiency — essentially the body’s ‘power plants’ — and improves cardiovascular and metabolic health,” Persaud explained. “Long-term studies also show active people live longer and have lower rates of chronic disease.”

Still, Trump isn’t the only person alive who appears to hold a weird “battery” theory of life force. Katie Gould, the founder of KG Strong, a kettlebell and strength training studio in Philadelphia, said she’s heard clients share their own versions of it.

“I’ve definitely had people worry that if they ‘use up’ their joints or heart with exercise, they’ll burn out faster,” Gould told HuffPost.

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But our bodies aren’t phone batteries with a fixed charge; like our muscles, our bodies are systems that adapt to the demands we place on them, Gould said.

“Smart, appropriately dosed movement actually improves energy, resilience, and longevity over time,” she said. “What really wears us down isn’t using our bodies, it’s never using them at all.”

OK, but where would Trump have come up with this?

If you dwell on it long enough, Trump’s reported theory almost sounds like an ancient belief ― or at the very least, something no modern person would believe.

Aristotle did actually think that our bodies are animated by a kind of innate heat, and that death occurs when it is finally depleted. But the Greek philosopher and polymath was pro-exercise, according to Donald J. Robertson, a  psychotherapist and author of “How to Think Like a Roman Emperor.”

“He certainly didn’t think we were at risk of ‘running out’ of energy by running around too much,” Robertson told HuffPost.

If anything, Trump has more in common with certain 19th-century vitalists, who worried that modern overstimulation and overexertion could drain the body’s “nerve force,” Robertson said.

“That led to a short-lived medical fad for diagnosing patients with ‘nervous exhaustion’ or neurasthenia,” the psychotherapist explained.

Silas Weir Mitchell, a Philadelphia-based physician, went on to develop the once-famous “rest cure” for neurasthenia, which was an extreme regimen of enforced inactivity, bed rest, and high-calorie feeding designed to rebuild the patient’s supposedly depleted vital reserves.

“I actually think it’s possible, unless he was joking, that Trump has somehow absorbed these sorts of ideas from somewhere or other,” Robertson said.

What should a 79-year-old person be doing for exercise to stay healthy?

The White House claimed earlier this week that Trump’s MRI from October, during his second “yearly” check-up in just six months, shows the 79-year-old is in “excellent health.” (It’s a statement that seems to be at odds with Trump’s diagnosis less than six months ago of “chronic venous insufficiency.”)

Sleeping on your physical fitness isn’t going to help most of us as we age, though. If anything, the misconception that exercise is dangerous is what actually puts people at higher risk for frailty, falls and chronic disease, Persaud said.

“While standing and public speaking is demanding and burns some calories, it does not provide the cardiovascular or musculoskeletal benefits that help people stay strong and independent as they age,” she said.

For adults, the American Heart Association recommends 150 minutes of moderately intense activity per week, plus strength training twice weekly. Even simple things like brisk walking, light strength work, or tai chi have proven benefits for heart health, mobility and longevity, Persaud told us.

Gould said that at 79, you want to have a mix of walking or other cardio, strength training for muscle and bone health, and some balance work to help prevent falls.

“The people I see thriving in their 70s and beyond aren’t just on their feet, they’re loading their muscles, challenging their hearts and moving in a variety of ways consistently,” she said.

Gould added that blasé comments about exercise usually come from a place of considerable privilege. It’s easier to say you “don’t need” to work out when you have doctors tracking your labs, chefs managing your food, and money to throw at health problems, as the president does.

“Most people don’t have that, but they do have access to movement, and strength training in particular is one of the most powerful, affordable tools we have to live longer, more capable lives,” Gold said.

For women especially, lifting weights helps protect bone density, reduce fall risk, and build the confidence to move through the world on their own terms. She added that it’s an especially important message to emphasize right now as more people experiment with GLP-1s for weight loss.

“In a moment when so many people are being pushed toward quick fixes and weight-loss drugs, it’s important to remind folks that strength and sport are not cosmetic ― they’re health care,” she said.

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