Quartz: The Most Effective Form Of Exercise Isn’t Exercise At All. “Have you recently carried heavy shopping bags up a few flights of stairs? Or run the last 100 meters to the station to catch your train? If you have, you may have unknowingly been doing a style of exercise called high-intensity incidental physical activity.” (I’ve sprinted and lunged for the last Tater Tot a few times. Hopefully that qualifies…)