According to a new study by athletics trainer, Dacid Siik of Equinox, trance is the best music to work out to.
Siik runs the club’s elite treadmill program and did research on the Mozart Effect. The Mozart Effect is the result of a 1991 study by Dr. Alfred A. Tomatis that showed listening to music by the composer had healing effects on the brain.
“Here’s the thing about the Mozart Effect,” Siik told Billboard. “It’s just the belief that by listening to Mozart as opposed to other types of music, especially lyrical music, you tend to perform better in testing like IQ tests, cognitive tests, reading tests.”
He then created his own test relating to exercise with trance music from the likes of Armin Van Buuren and Radio 6.
“I looked at the Mozart Effect as a starting point but I was never planning on playing Mozart in the class,” he said. “All that means is the choice between lyrical music versus non-lyrical music affects the brain and your motivation and feelings. It’s been studied for a long time but it hasn’t really been applied to fitness.
“I found that the most robust library falls with the hi-energy/trance music, which is perfect because trance by its very nature has a lot of patternation in its notes.”
His explanation for the results was that athletes can concentrate better if they are listening to music without lyrics.
“If you have, say, Justin Timberlake feeding you this awesome story and then you have a coach, David Siik, telling you to subtract 1.8 from your personal record, and add a 2 per cent incline, I believe it’s overstimulating your language processing center and studies support that,” Siik said. “The multitasking that is caused by lyrical music in the background dramatically reduces focus and retention.
“If you’re just going out for five miles with no decisions, you should play whatever music you enjoy,” Siik added. “But for anybody who’s looking for a little bit of challenge in their workouts and wants to create a sense of structure – say going to Central Park and doing two minutes fast, one minute walk – try this music. I guarantee it changes the experience.”
There has been multiple studies focusing on electronic music including, the age you should give up clubbing, major labels that are making $9,000 per minute from streaming, the reason we’re addicted to bass, and even a study that found music stimulates the same part of the brain as sex, drugs, and food.
So next time you want to get a good workout, put on some trance!
Leave a Reply