I’ve been reading, and really enjoying, Gretchen Reynolds’ book on exercise science, The First Twenty Minutes: Surprising Science Reveals How We Can: Exercise Better, Train Smarter, Live Longer.
Lots of it is fun but for those of us who follow exercise science in the media not really news. I read Reynolds’ Phys Ed column in the New York Times and lots of the chapters cover in more detail, and with footnotes and references, material covered there. That’s fine. Nice to have it all in one place. High Intensity Interval Training beats out long, slow workouts. Yep. Chocolate milk is a better recovery drink than Gatorade. Yep. Exercise doesn’t help (much) in the quest to lose weight. Yep. Sad but true. OK, it gets worse. Massage after exercise–a cyclist’s favourite thing–doesn’t actually increase blood flow to muscles or help remove lactic acid to aid recovery. (Read about that sad result here, http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/02/phys-ed-does-massage-help-after-exercise/.) Still feels wonderful though so I’m sticking with that one. Science be damned.
But the chapter that is still rattling around in my brain is the one on exercise and aging. My blog title is the controversial way of posing the question Reynolds asks in less bold terms. What exactly is the connection between exercise and aging? The old view was that muscle loss and a decline in aerobic capacity were inevitable with old age. We slow down with age and become more frail, starting in our 40s, it seemed. But new research suggests the connections may run the other way. We become slower and more frail because we stop moving. Older athletes get slower and less strong, not because they’re older, but rather because they train less than younger athletes.
We age because we stop moving, on this way of thinking about the connection. It’s as if aging is something we choose to do. That’s a very intriguing idea. What’s positive about this is we could choose differently. We could choose to keep moving and avoid some of the physical decline we associate with old age. But what’s less clear is why older people slow down and take to their rockers. It may be that the psychological urge to rest is stronger than Reynolds and the researchers think. If aging brains are the problem, then slowing with age still might be inevitable.
I got a taste of the ‘use it or lose it’ idea this week when I went to physio for my injured shoulder. In addition to a host of exercises, I was complimented for getting right back to Aikido, Crossfit, etc. I shared with the physio dude the worry of friends and relatives that I ought to slow down while my shoulder healed, maybe even take time off lifting weights and doing martial arts. Yeah, he replied, lots of people think that and then they never regain the range of motion they had and it gets harder to go back to your usual physical activities. Keep moving, he said, echoing Reynolds.
If you want the short version of Reynolds on exercise and old age, look here: Aging Well Through Exercise, http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/09/aging-well-through-exercise/
As a older athlete I am lead to believe you can’t train as hard as you get older ,you need more recovery time I wonder if that is true .
It depends Lee. My recovery time is relatively short due to the nutrition I take in. Adaptogenic herbs and trace minerals can do wonders. It does take me longer to warm up. I’m 62.
This is a great post, very thought provoking! I guess I always thought with age comes less movement, more pains, but honestly I am beginning to think that it may be a choice? (Not sure, still trying to figure it out. I need to get my hands on that book!) I am 31 and I am in the best health and fitness of my life. Each year gets better. I see myself in the future as being a grandma that has her grandchildren running after her 😉
Agreed. Age is just a number. After just turning 62 I am able to do most things I could when I was 31.
Pete
I find this a really encouraging idea and I hope the tendency to want to slow down isn’t hard-wired. It makes sense to me that certain forms of activity will take their toll on the body over time, but that would just support some changes to the roster of physical activities, not outright stopping. I’m loving tai chi, for example, and I’m the youngest by far in my beginner’s class. I like the idea that it’s not a necessary truth that the body will deteriorate between 60 and 80. Maybe once we’ve reached 50 we should take the next decade to get even FITTER! Then we’ll be among the rockin’est octogenarians on the planet.
Agree completely. Makes me feel much more optimistic about the years ahead of fifty!
Reblogged this on Fit Is a Feminist Issue and commented:
You know how some people seem young at 50, and others much older, what if there were an element of choice about it all? What if we aged because we slowed down, rather than slowed down because of age? I’m still thinking about this. Here’s a post on the topic for a few years ago.
What a fantastic article! There is so much truth and i feel like more people need to know about this. older age should not equate to decline in activity. my martial arts instructor is in his late sixties and just ran his first tough mudder this year. that should just go to show you that age is really just a number