Training scents: you may be able to sniff your way to better workouts with tricks from the aromatherapist's bag - Energy

Men's Fitness, May, 2002 by Frank Claps

* Grapefruit Arthritis, depression, obesity, bad skin

YOUR NOSE-BRAIN CONNECTION

Of the five senses, smell elicits the quickest recognition and response from the brain. Odors activate nasal-cavity nerve cells, which then transmit impulses to the limbic portion of the brain, which is linked to emotions and memories. Therefore it's believed that some odors provoke emotional responses. Our sense of smell may also affect our physiology. The limbic system activates the hypothalamus, which sends messages to the pituitary gland; the latter is in charge of hormones that control many of our bodily functions, leading some researchers to hypothesize a relationship between odors and the systems governing some basic drives and instincts, among them hunger, sex, fear and aggression.

Writer Frank Claps operates Fitness for Any Body, his own personal-training company. He can be reached at claps@nni.com.