Shadowing Practice: Stop Walking 10,000 Steps/Day (do this for 10 minutes instead) - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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What are your thoughts on exercise and the current suggestions and recommendations around exercise?
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Well, I'm glad you asked this question.
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I think I've been thinking about this a lot.
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I did a podcast on the current exercise guidelines, and I think they need to be updated.
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I think they're not good enough.
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And it's important for people to realize how these exercise guidelines were formulated and what they mean. So typically,
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you'll hear exercise guidelines 150 to 300 minutes a week of moderate intensity exercise is good for optimal health
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or 75 minutes to 150 minutes a week of vigorous intensity exercise, right?
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So they're basically a two-to-one ratio, right?
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Twice as many minutes for moderate intensity as vigorous intensity.
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What is defined as moderate versus vigorous?
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That's also important because it's different across different studies.
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In these guidelines, it's basically moderate intensity is you're walking.
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You're moving with intent, but not really, really fast.
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You're walking at maybe a fast pace, but you're not jogging and you're not running.
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That kind of activity would be considered moderate.
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Vigorous would be considered jogging, running, swimming, cycling.
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So the kind of activity where you're actually moving fast with intent.
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Why do we have this two to one ratio?
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Where did it come from?
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Well, it all came from energy expenditure.
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You burn twice as many calories if you're doing vigorous intensity exercise as you do if you're doing moderate intensity, right?
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So if you're walking one mile, you'll burn X amount of calories.
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If you jog that mile, you'll burn twice as many calories.
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That's where these guidelines came from, the two-to-one ratio, right?
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Weight loss, energy expenditure.
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But that's not necessarily what's important for reducing cancer mortality, reducing cardiovascular-related mortality, reducing all-cause mortality, right?
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These guidelines use that data, this two-to-one ratio of energy expenditure, And then they looked at other studies and said,
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okay, how much exercise is required to reduce cardiovascular weight mortality or all-cause mortality?
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And they kind of like connected the dots.
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By the way, these studies also were using questionnaires.
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They weren't actually measuring how active people were.
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A new study came out, and I did a Journal Club podcast on it
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because it was the study that I felt was so important
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that I wanted to break down all the components of the study with another scientist.
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and talk about them because it's very important.
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So journal clubs, typically in science, you have them in my career, it was, you know, sometimes it was once a week, other times it was once a month.
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And someone, you choose a study that's important, and you break it down, and you talk about the results, and you talk about the methods, and talk about what the findings mean.
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That's what a journal club is.
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And it's essentially, you choose a journal and a publication within that journal, and it's a club.
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You have different scientists that are talking about it.
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Why did this warrant a journal club?
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Because I think this study basically is strong enough data that it's implying we need to change our exercise guidelines,
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at least the messaging of them, at the very least.
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And I'll tell you why.
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Because I talked about these guidelines, how they're formulated.
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They're using questionnaires.
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They're not measuring anything.
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Well, a new study came out.
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Not only did it measure physical activity through these accelerometers, it was able to measure how active people were and the type of activity, whether it was, I mentioned moderate versus vigorous.
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They also measured light physical activity.
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That would be considered walking around your house, kind of doing that kind of light activity, not necessarily going for a walk or going for a run.
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And they looked at deaths from different causes of disease.
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They looked at deaths from all causes.
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So all-cause mortality.
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They looked at cancer-related deaths.
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They looked at cardiovascular-related deaths.
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They looked at type 2 diabetes.
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They looked at heart attacks, right?
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And what was so profound was that what we found,
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what they found, and what we now know is that everything changes in terms of how important vigorous intensity exercise is.
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It's so much more valuable than we thought.
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It's not two to one.
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So if we're looking at all-cause mortality, you know, dying from all causes, cancer, respiratory, anything related that's non-accidental, for every one minute of vigorous intensity exercise,
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you had to do four minutes of moderate intensity,
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and you had to do like 100 to 150 minutes of light exercise to get the same reduction in all-cause mortality.
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For every one minute.
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For every one minute of vigorous intensity exercise.
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It gets better, okay?
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For every one minute of vigorous intensity exercise to reduce your death from cardiovascular disease, you had to do eight minutes of moderate intensity
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and 200 minutes of light exercise for every one minute of vigorous intensity exercise.
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It's huge.
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To reduce your type 2 diabetes risk, for every one minute of vigorous, you had to do 10 minutes of moderate intensity, or you had to do,
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again, you're in the 150 minutes to 200 minutes of light exercise.
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To reduce your risk of dying from cancer, for every one minute of vigorous intensity exercise, you had to do four minutes, about four minutes of moderate intensity.
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And for light, it was like, it was almost not even happening.
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I mean, it was like 250, 300, like you had to just a ton of minutes, unbelievable amount of minutes, okay?
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But the value of vigorous intensity exercise is so much more than this two to one ratio based on energy expenditure,
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based on burning calories that our guidelines were based on.
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It's time to rethink them.
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It's time to tell people, hey, if you're getting out and you're going for a run, it is worth way more than you think it is in terms of reducing your disease risk
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and your death from that disease, right?
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Also, what was really interesting about this study, and this goes back to this exercise snacks that we talked about before last episode,
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is that because there were people or participants were wearing these accelerometers on their wrist, they were able to measure all physical activity.
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Let's say you have a new puppy and you're sprinting in the yard
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and playing with them for a minute or two minutes or three minutes or whatever, not 30 minutes in the gym, right?
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Or not 30 minutes on the treadmill, but you're just a short burst, or you're playing with your grandkids or your kids and you're playing tag, whatever.
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Those moments count.
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They really add up.
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And that is also a take home from this study
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and other studies is that you can actually get massive benefits from the sprinting, the vigorous exercise, one minute, two minutes, three minutes.
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Women that did three
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and a half minutes of just this vigorous types of exercise per day lowered their cancer risk by 40%.
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Yes, three and a half minutes a day.
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This was in women.
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Now, there's bigger studies showing men and women that exercise nine minutes a day, the short, vigorous types of exercise, adding up, not nine minutes altogether, but like a minute here,
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a minute there, a minute here, right?
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It adds up.
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40% lower cancer-related mortality, 50% lower cardiovascular-related mortality.
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And that's another big take-home from this study
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that I really want people to know about because some people don't like spending 30 minutes or putting out, blocking out a 30-minute time or an hour-long time to go to the gym.
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They should.
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I mean, if they want their peak span, that's what you're going to have to do.
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But if you're just wanting to avoid disease and be in your health span,
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you know, you can get that by doing these short moments of short bursts of physical activity, and those count.
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And some people are like, oh, thank God.
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Thank God I can do that because I hate going to the gym.
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I'll, you know, they just won't do it.
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They won't do it.
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A lot of people as well are caught up with this 10,000 steps a day thing.
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Yes.
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10,000 steps a day.
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What's that facial reaction for people that can't see your face?
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She looked up into the corner like I personally offended her.
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Yeah.
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I look, any exercise is better than none.
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I want to just get that on the table.
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Okay.
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That's important.
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I don't want to totally diss the 10,000 steps a day, but I think that we need to ditch it.
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I think we need to ditch 10,000 steps a day and say 10 minutes a day.
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10 minutes a day of getting your heart rate up.
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You can do bodyweight squats.
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You can, you know, play tag with your kids or your grandkids.
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You can do shorter bursts of it, but it needs to be 10 minutes.
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And if you get to that 10 minutes a day, 50% lower cardiovascular-related mortality, 50% lower all-cause mortality, 40% lower cancer mortality.
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That is what you're going to get.
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10,000 steps a day is not gonna get you that.
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We just talked about it.
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It's not gonna get you that, right?
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It's a different ratio.
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It's not two to one ratio.
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I imagine there's people thinking, you used three terms that are vigorous, moderate, and light.
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We probably need to quite clearly define those definitions.
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Like what is vigorous?
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Right.
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Heart rate, is it or?
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Vigorous intensity exercise can be heart rate and it is heart rate in a lot of studies that are done.
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In terms of the exercise guidelines, they don't use heart rate, they're using movement.
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Like when I say accelerometer, I mean moving fast.
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So they're able to measure the acceleration of your movement.
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And so the way that they're talking about it in these exercise guidelines studies is moving fast.
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Moving fast would be jogging, running, swimming, biking, you're moving stepper stepper would would stepper we'd be moving fat
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even even weights are moving fast that's part of it too weights you're doing you're doing weights wait
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because you'll because they're on your wrist and so if you're
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if you're doing bicep curls or you're doing you know something with your with your wrists
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that are fast it's part of that it's part of
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that equation as well heart rate isn't the thing they were measuring
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but that's a consequence of moving fast it is it is
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so you want to be thinking about getting your heart rate personally
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when i think about it and if i'm talking about in the context of these exercise guidelines,
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I would say that heart vigorous would be probably considered 70% or more of your max heart rate would be considered vigorous.
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Previously, when I'm talking about vigorous, I also talk about high-intensity interval training, and that's more like 80% of your max heart rate or higher.
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Very important for improving VO2 max and cardiorespiratory fitness.
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But in these studies, heart rate is more like a 70% your max heart rate and more, because that's you can be jogging at that rate right jogging
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or running that's a big that's vigorous intensity exercise if you're below
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that if you're like you know 50% your max heart rate that's considered moderate intensity
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and then you know maybe even lower than that
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if you're just sort of you know walking around the house
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I mean that's not even going out much at all that's light that's considered light
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 160 sentences and 1921 words to shadow. The speech runs for 10:27. The speaker talks fast, about 184 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 85% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| intensity noun | /ɪnˈtɛnsɪti/ | The quality of being intense. |
| moderate adjective | /ˈmɑdəɹət/ | Not excessive; acting in moderation. |
| mortality noun | /mɔɹˈtælɪti/ | The state of being susceptible to death. |
| ratio noun | /ˈɹeɪ.ʃoʊ/ | A number representing a comparison between two named things. |
| cardiovascular adjective | /ˌkɑːdi.əʊˈvæskjʊlə(ɹ)/ | Relating to the circulatory system, that is the heart and blood vessels. |
| expenditure noun | /ɛkˈspɛndɪt͡ʃə/ | Act of expending or paying out. |
| calorie noun | /ˈkæləɹi/ | A non-SI unit of energy, equivalent to 4.184 kilojoules, that can raise the temperature of a kilogram of water by one degree Celsius. This is the unit normally… |
| burst verb | /bɜːst/ | To break from internal pressure. |
| wrist noun | /ɹɪst/ | The complex joint between forearm bones, carpus, and metacarpals where the hand is attached to the arm; the carpus in a narrow sense. |
| necessarily adverb | /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/ | Inevitably; of necessity. |
| spin verb | /spɪn/ | To rotate, revolve, gyrate (usually quickly); to partially or completely rotate to face another direction. |
| versus | /ˈvɝsəs/ | Against; in opposition to. |
| define verb | /dɪˈfaɪn/ | To determine with precision; to mark out with distinctness; to ascertain or exhibit clearly. |
| intent noun | /ɪnˈtɛnt/ | Something that is intended. |
| scientist noun | /ˈsaɪəntəst/ | One whose activities make use of the scientific method to answer questions regarding the measurable universe. A scientist may be involved in original research… |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| add up verb | To take the sum of; to total. | |
| come out verb | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | To be discovered; to be revealed. |
| walk around verb | To walk with no planned destination; to meander. | |
| break down verb | To stop functioning. | |
| get out verb | To leave or escape. | |
| go back to verb | To stem from; to originate in. | |
| go out verb | To leave, especially a building. | |
| put out verb | To blind (eyes). |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if you're walking one mile, you'll burn · If you jog that mile, you'll burn |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | be updated · were formulated · is defined |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 59 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, they're, you'll. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: altogether /ɔl.tuˈɡɛð.ɚ/, rethink /ɹiːˈθɪŋk/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: ratio /ˈɹeɪ.ʃoʊ/, publication /ˌpʌblɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, reduction /ɹɪˈdʌk.ʃən/, suggestion /səˈd͡ʒɛst.ʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: intensity /ɪnˈtɛnsɪti/, mortality /mɔɹˈtælɪti/, cardiovascular /ˌkɑːdi.əʊˈvæskjʊlə(ɹ)/, expenditure /ɛkˈspɛndɪt͡ʃə/, necessarily /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like intensity, moderate, mortality.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.