Age-appropriate training; why your muscles don’t build like they did years ago.

Many of our patients train and go to the gym regularly to help them maintain strength, posture, and form.

The only problem is, as we age, it seems like it takes more work to achieve the same goals as we achieved in our younger years.

It is well established that weight training has its benefits in older people. what is not often talked about is the age appropriateness of certain workouts.

I found this great article about how 50-year-old muscles don’t train like they used to. There is science behind these ideas. Agoing is inevitable and as we age we need to play the game better. Check this article out below.

50-Year-Old Muscles Just Can’t Grow Big Like They Used to—The Biology of How Muscles Change With Age

As people age, the chemical signaling pathways in muscles become less potent, and it gets harder to build muscle and maintain strength. But the health benefits of strength training only increase with age.

By Roger Fielding

There is perhaps no better way to see the absolute pinnacle of human athletic abilities than by watching the Olympics. But at the Winter Games this year – and at almost all professional sporting events – you rarely see a competitor over 40 years old and almost never see a single athlete over 50. This is because with every additional year spent on Earth, bodies age and muscles don’t respond to exercise the same as they used to.

I lead a team of scientists who study the health benefits of exercise, strength training and diet in older people. We investigate how older people respond to exercise and try to understand the underlying biological mechanisms that cause muscles to increase in size and strength after resistance or strength training.

Old and young people build muscle in the same way. But as you age, many of the biological processes that turn exercise into muscle become less effective. This makes it harder for older people to build strength but also makes it that much more important for everyone to continue exercising as they age.