In this episode I discuss why AGE IS JUST A NUMBER and how we can gain lean muscle mass at ANY age!
SUMMARY:
- Age is just a number. Fitness is about ABILITY!
- Key #1 To Gaining Muscle: Use it or lose it! Keep doing the things that made you strong and “young” in the first place!
- Key #2 To Gaining Muscle: Lift heavy! Challenge yourself. You are not too old to push hard in the gym. We need to work around our needs and goals and injuries but age should not dictate what we do! While we need to recognize how our “lifestyle” has added up, our AGE shouldn’t be a deciding factor of how we train.
- Key #3 To Gaining Muscle: Dial in your diet! Eat enough and focus on PROTEIN!
3 KEY TAKEAWAYS:
- Use it or lose it!
- Challenge yourself with your workouts!
- Don’t fall for fad diets and focus on protein!
RS PROGRAMS:
- The Macro Hacks Program – The best results happen when our diet and workouts work together. And my Macro Hacks goes over how to dial in your diet at EVERY AGE!
STUDIES:
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Resistance training is medicine: effects of strength training on health. “Benefits of resistance training include improved physical performance, movement control, walking speed, functional independence, cognitive abilities, and self-esteem. Resistance training may assist prevention and management of type 2 diabetes by decreasing visceral fat, reducing HbA1c, increasing the density of glucose transporter type 4, and improving insulin sensitivity. Resistance training may enhance cardiovascular health, by reducing resting blood pressure, decreasing low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides, and increasing high-density lipoprotein cholesterol. Resistance training may promote bone development, with studies showing 1% to 3% increase in bone mineral density. Resistance training may be effective for reducing low back pain and easing discomfort associated with arthritis and fibromyalgia and has been shown to reverse specific aging factors in skeletal muscle.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22777332
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Physical activity and all-cause mortality across levels of overall and abdominal adiposity in European men and women: the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition Study (EPIC). “One European study enlisted 334,161 individuals and followed up with them over 12.4 years. Among the vast amount of data they discovered, they found that those doing as little as 20 minutes of light exercise daily could reduce a person’s risk of early death by as much as 30%.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2573364
- Muscle mass and strength gains following 6 months of resistance type exercise training are only partly preserved within one year with autonomous exercise continuation in older adults. “Though prolonged RT can effectively increase muscle mass and strength in the older population, muscle mass gains are lost and muscle strength gains are only partly preserved within one year if the supervised exercise program is not continued.”
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0531556518306673 - The effects of resistance training volume on osteosarcopenic obesity in older women. “By doing 1 set of exercises three times a week were enough to provide increases in strength, skeletal muscle mass, and decreased body fat over 12 weeks. Increasing that to 3 sets of exercises three times a week resulted in a dramatic boost in results.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29125017
- Skeletal muscle protein metabolism in the elderly: Interventions to counteract the ‘anabolic resistance’ of ageing. “Resistance exercise combined with amino acid ingestion elicits the greatest anabolic response and may assist elderly in producing a ‘youthful’ muscle protein synthetic response provided sufficient protein is ingested following exercise.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21975196?dopt=Abstract - When we do more extreme diets and end up losing more lean muscle mass, we put ourselves at greater risk for rebounding! Minimizing the loss of fat-free mass may help dieters prevent weight regain after the diet. Best practices for fat-free mass retention include an effective resistance training program, a conservative rate of weight loss, an emphasis on sufficient protein intake, adequate sleep, and appropriate management of cardiovascular training variables. Associations between the proportion of fat-free mass loss during weight loss, changes in appetite, and subsequent weight change: results from a randomized 2-stage dietary intervention trial. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31950141
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26883880?dopt=Abstract
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40520-019-01234-2
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28871849
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8030593
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3117172/
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40520-019-01155-0
Cori, I’m becoming addicted to your science content. For me this is an amazing portal to consume science and practice (what is pretty scarce nowadays). Additionally, your devotion to develop creative routines are inspiring. Thanks to push our field forward, aligning science, practice, motivation and huge amounts of charisma. Fantastic example… especially representing women in this industry. Respectfully, a big hug from Brazil, you certainly have one more admirer.
Thank you for this. Use it or lose it is the healthy takeaway for me. Your final point about matching healthy diet to healthy workout nailed me.
Glad it helps!
Thank you! I’m so glad the videos help! And I’m so flattered.
Hi Cori! Thanks for this. How much protein should I injest after my workout and within what window?
Your article is an excellent summary of many excellent sources to give the not so young crowd direction to living better and getting off the couch. Several sources I have come across are pushing for more protein and I am trying it out and it seems be helping. As yourself, Grey steel YouTube channel explains working out with barbells in compound exercises has great gains. I think working with dumbbells has many benefits too, but his main point is that four compound exercises does as much good as a lot of isolated lifts. His older lifters are in their 90s and 80s so he has proof that muscle can be built at any age…
Hi Cori,
How much protein should one be eating. I’m 44, 5ft 8inches and I weight 90kg! (Don’t look it though weirdly).
I have a problem with cellulite in my thighs and want to build lean muscle to minimize the appearance, however, I’m not sure how to target. I’ve been doing lunges and squats no end with 4 kg weights, but wondering maybe the reason the cellulite is still there is because I’m either not eating enough protein or not lifting heavy enough.
I look fwd to your expert opinion.
P s. Kudos for all those links to studies. I love me some evidence-based exercise and nutrition 🙂
Awesome podcast thank you!! I’m a 47 year old woman and I reached my weight goal of 130 lbs after counting my macros for some time. My goal was to get to 130 lbs, and then increase my weight again, by increasing my muscle mass. I have been at a light deficit, so now that my weight is where I wanted to be, do I need to be in maintenance to be able to increase my muscle mass or do I need to stay in deficit? I weight train at home 5 days a week. I’m seeing great definition in my smaller muscles; shoulders, bis, tris, but now I want to focus more on the bigger muscles aka booty!🍑 thank you in advance for any input! Keep those awesome articles and podcasts coming! They are great and very inspiring!!! 💝
So as you know my minioncorn, the key is overall macros, but I’m going to have Kristina make some tweaks. We can have you getting up to 40g post.
Definitely key we do all we can from a training and fueling perspective to address the changes that come with age. Because there is so much we can do over just “accepting” the changes as the way it has to be.
The exact macros you use depend on so many factors. And even then we want to cycle and adjust. Here’s a great beginners guide to help you start making changes – https://redefiningstrength.com/fhp-s2e21-starting-to-count-macros-5-tips-for-beginners/
Maintenance is a process itself with small adjustments to reach specific goals, whether we shift to gaining for a bit or back to body recomp. Here are tips to help. https://redefiningstrength.com/fhp-s2e29-5-tips-to-maintain-your-results/
I was told to use light weights until I get my form down . What do you think about that? Also, does training with weights with bad posture make it worse? Thanks in advance.
No weight should ever be light. It should challenge us for the reps and sets. We may modify moves to build up but it should still challenge us as we are learning the form based on the way we design the workouts and focus on muscle engagement.
I’ve been following you for a while and have such respect for your knowledge and expertise.
I’m a 54 year old woman trying to keep/improve my lean muscle mass.
I’ve been reading a lot about peptide therapy. Do you have an opinion on this ?
Does this include body weight exercises?
Your science/reference posts are invaluable. At 67 F, I am doing my best to avoid my parents’ mistakes: inactivity. I will shift my macro ratios, as I’ve reached my initial goal, but even that goal needs to be changed. I really appreciate all you do, thank you so much!
I believe you need the fundamentals first dialed in then you can worry about supplementation. 🙂 Are you strength training? Increasing your protein and eating enough by tracking your macros?
If it challenges you, it can change you and help you build muscle. But you need to create progression in your workouts.
Our ratios will constantly be evolving as will our training over time as our needs and goals change.
Want more muscle strength training.. for running
Strength training is definitely key for adding muscle, and even improving our running. Depending on what you’re doing, you may even find starting with bodyweight to be key. But definitely lots of unilateral strength work will be helpful!
Informative & inspiring !
Cheers!
Thank you!
Send me info please
Hi Sheri! What are you looking for more info on? I’d love to see how I can help! Emailed you as well!