Sudoku lovers rejoice – apparently an hour’s worth or mental exercises can burn up to 90 calories. Mental health expert Tim Forrester, from the brain exercise website cannyminds.com, claims that giving the brain a workout burns calories in the same way that a physical exercise session does.
He said that our brains require 0.1 calories every minute just to function, so when they are being challenged we burn 1.5 calories a minute. The brain requires chemicals called neurotransmitters to relay signals to neurons that communicate with each other, sending messages to the body. The neurons extract glucose sugar to send their messages, so when they are working particularly hard more calories are used up.
According to Mr. Forrester’s calculations, a nice hour spent puzzling over the crossword could therefore burn off 1 ½ chocolate chip cookies, with each providing 56 calories, or a jammy dodger, at 86 calories. Which perhaps doesn’t give much license for a huge blow-out, but crosswords are definitely more fun with a nice cup of tea and a custard cream to help the cogitations.
Sadly the calories involved are so small that the news is unlikely to rock the dieting world, and it seems unlikely that weight-loss gurus are going to be advocating the ‘suduku diet’ any time soon. Those serious about losing weight are still much better off spending an hour going for a run, but still – its a nice fact to keep in mind next time you’re doing the cryptic crossword