I was 50 yesterday and I had a lovely day, but I started it in the gym lifting weights, and I was up and out for a HIIT session and a run this morning. Here’s why…
If you’re over 40 then chances are you’re losing something quite important, probably without even realising it. The thing is by the time you do start to realise, it will be because your health and mobility have been impacted.
I’m talking about sarcopenia— age-related muscle loss. It can begin from around the age of 35 and occurs at a rate of 1-2 percent a year, accelerating to 3 percent per year in our 60s.
This could equate to around 4 to 6 pounds of lost muscle each decade, and we lose fast twitch fibres (power) faster so we’re not only getting weaker, but slower.
Now, you may not notice it at first in terms of your energy and ability to do things, but over time you will – loss of muscle mass not only means a loss of strength, but your balance is affected, you have less power to correct and your ability to recover from illness or injury is impacted.
In tandem the mitochondria in your cells that provide power and endurance decrease, meaning less energy, and without regular use your nerve receptors that recruit muscles deteriorate.
Finally. not only are you getting slower, weaker, more prone to injury, less balanced, and having less energy, but you’re also likely to put on fat. Muscle is metabolically active, meaning it burns calories even at rest.
As we lose muscle our metabolic rate drops, meaning that we start to store energy as body fat. As we’re becoming more insulin resistant as we age, meaning we’re less efficient at processing our food for energy, there’s a compounding effect. This is how many midlife men end up diabetic or pre-diabetic without recognising it.
The good news is, there’s something very simple you can do to offset these changes and stay energised, strong, healthy and lean. And that thing is…
Exercise. Now at midlife and beyond as our hormonal makeup is vastly different to what it was in our 20s and 30s we need to workout in a particular way…
We want to boost those mitochondria – so HIIT and cardio are in for that – but shorter sessions with adequate recovery.
We also want to preserve that muscle mass, so resistance training at least twice a week is in. This could be the gym, but it could also be at home with your bodyweight or simple kit like resistance bands and kettlebells.
This is how we coach our clients to get them awesome physical results and get their energy levels restored. In a couple of weeks or so we’ll be running a free live training on all this and more. If you want in then just let me know by dropping a thumbs up or an “I’m in”, below and I’ll get you details.