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How physical activity can and will help you improve at osu!

posted
Total Posts
5

Do you get at least 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity per week?

I get at least 150 minutes per week
32
44.44%
I don't get at least 150 minutes, but I do get some physical activity each week (maybe an hour a week)
9
12.50%
I do very little physical activity each week.
31
43.06%
Total votes: 72
Topic Starter
ketnon
We all know physical exercise (mainly aerobic/cardio) is extremely beneficial to the body, providing not only physiological benefits but also greatly boosts cognitive function. But realistically, how often do we get the recommended amount of exercise per week? Maybe you're not sure how beneficial exercise is, or maybe you think that the time spent on exercising is not worth the benefits. However, research suggests that even walking just 30 minutes a day 4-5 days a week can drastically improve reaction speed, memory, and even boosts neuroplasticity (your brains ability to change and create new connections when learning).

Do you ever have a day where you felt like you improved a lot in osu!? Maybe you figured out a way to read a specific pattern properly, or you were able to finally fix your grip and able to aim extremely efficiently. Suddenly a week goes by, and suddenly you can't remember exactly how your gripped your pen, or your focus is completely wack and you are unable to read anything consistently. Many of these issues I just listed could be solved just by simply adding some physical activity to your daily routine. Exercise not only just improves your mood, but it helps improve your focus and ability to learn and retain new information. No longer are the days that you are unable to hit a pattern because your mind can't stop thinking about how much pp it would be if you fc'd the map.

One way exercise helps is it reverses the shrinking of the hippocampus as you age, a region of the brain that is used to retain information. While it seems like memory isn't that important for this game, it actually is really essential in your improvement. When you play and improve, it's essential that you are able to keep that improvement for the next day, so that you can progress even further. If your memory is bad, you may have to spend alot of time working on one skill while if you had better memory, you could have progressed to the next skill already. Having good memory will boost your improvement speed and be able to hit that rank you always wanted to hit.


I think the benefits of exercise are very underrated, and a lot of people might think it is a waste of time. Any physical activity is better than none. You don't have to exercise in long intervals, especially if you are busy. If you are able to just spend 10 minutes to take a walk 3 times a day, it'll greatly benefit you in every way. However, if you are able to, research suggests that the more you exercise, the more benefits you'll reap. Exercise helps boost all aspects of your body, and it greatly decreases your chance of getting some very scary illnesses, such as heart disease, cancer, and in my opinion the scariest of them all, Alzheimer's/Dementia. If preventing those diseases aren't enough to convince you, exercise might make the difference in your focus/reaction time to be able to read HR or DT.

If you don't believe how beneficial exercise is to your brain, go check out some of these articles regarding physical activity and how it benefits the brain. There's already a ton of research that supports these claims, and I'm sure there will be more as time goes on.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/exercise-can-boost-your-memory-and-thinking-skills
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5934999/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3951958/
https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/fitness/in-depth/want-a-strong-brain-exercise/art-20390074
Sophie Twilight
I jog with songs playing from my phone. It gives me ideas on how to map those songs.
ShinRun
It's all fun and game until mrekk with a six pack FC a 15* map
Kolmas
It’s not like you should do exercise just for osu, it’s for your general well-being
Topic Starter
ketnon

Kolmas wrote:

It’s not like you should do exercise just for osu, it’s for your general well-being
Yes, but I feel like often people don't think exercise is worth it to prevent illnesses that won't happen to them for a while, so hopefully people will do it to not only improve their wellbeing but also improve their gameplay.
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