I just came across this article about high impact exercise and believe it or not, as active as I am, never really thought much about why it is or is not good for the body. I was curious to hear what others consider 'high impact' and what you do for exercises that may fall into this 'category'. Also, do you see much benefit out of high impact exercises?

My high impact exercise is running. The advantage of high impact exercise is it is believed to improve bone density from the many impacts which should reduce the inevitable osteoporosis. I have not reviewed the literature to see if research bears it out but it seems reasonable to me. The drawback of high impact is its potential for damage to bone and cartilage with people with underlying problems. You will not see any shortterm benefits to bones from high impact.

Thanks for the response g8r80. I went back and read that article on high impact workout and noticed a comment that was pretty funny:

"The Surgeon General’s high impact activity recommendation for a healthy population is 50 three-inch jumps per day."

I mean really, how did they come up with this number???

3 inches??? that's like jump roping. Multiply that number by 8 and reduce the number of jumps to 15