New Rules For Exercise and Fitness If You’re Over 50

https://youtu.be/KbA7-fN159M

 

This is Coach Chad here at Back In Motion, and today we’re going to talk about how exercise changes when you turn 50.

 

When you hit the age of 50 a funny thing happens. Your body doesn’t respond to exercise as it did earlier in your life.

 

Fatigue, muscle and joint aches, and increased injuries seem to happen with greater frequency.

 

In this article, we are going to go over 5 new rules that maybe you followed in the past about fitness and exercise that change for people in their 50’s and beyond.

 

#1 Stretching Is No Longer An Option

 

First, we’re going to talk about flexibility and stretching.

 

So after every workout, you should always be stretching because one, if you overextend your muscle, it’s so much more prone to injury just because you’ve just contracted your muscles during your workout.

 

You were weightlifting, and now all your muscles are shortened and tightened so making sure to stretch after every workout is so important to prevent injury.

 

If you don’t stretch, straining a muscle or tearing a muscle is more likely to happen because it’s so tense and tight.

 

So we want to make sure the muscle tissue and the muscle bellies are nice and lengthened so that way it’s not tight and it’s nice and relaxed after the workout.

 

#2 Resistance Training Takes Center Stage

 

Another thing that happens to you as we age, is we lose bone density and bone mass.

 

We also lose muscle mass as we get older because of a lack of testosterone and our body can’t hold on to the muscle mass any longer and it starts to decline.

 

We can prevent that decline with resistance training. Resistance training can help increase bone density, bone mass, and help slow down the deterioration of your bones.

 

Also, it will hold on to muscle tissue for as long as it can and just help restrengthen the body and help rebuild muscle tissue.

 

On top of that, the more muscles you have in your body, the higher your resting metabolic rate is.

 

So that means you’re going to burn more calories at a resting rate with more muscle in your body as opposed to someone that doesn’t have as much muscle.

 

So making sure that you are lifting weights and resistance training, that’s huge on keeping that muscle tissue and that bone density nice and strong.

 

Also, it can help you burn more calories and burn more fat. So, there’s a lot of positivities to resistance and weight training.

 

#3 Use Interval Training To Pump Up The Fat Burn

 

Number three we have high-intensity interval training. So, HIIT training is really important to escalate those heart rates up and be in that fat-burning zone.

 

By keeping the heart rate elevated for a prolonged period of time and then coming back down helps greatly with fat loss.

 

So with interval training, you’re bringing your heart rate up nice and high, and then you’re going to deescalate it back down. Bring it back up and then deescalate back down.

 

By taking it up in the intervals, you can go as fast as you can then you can go for a little walk, as fast as you can, but you’re skyrocketing those heart rates up to the fat-burning zone, but you’re breaking it up in intervals.

 

That way you’re not burning yourself out. So, high-intensity interval training is very important for burning fat and also you can build muscle.

 

Sprinting is very anabolic, it’s an anaerobic exercise, so it can actually build a lot of muscle tissue as well.

 

So, high-intensity interval training is a great way to burn fat but also keep muscle tissue strong as well.

 

#4 Incorporate Balance Exercises

 

Number four, incorporating balance exercises into your fitness routine. So, something that goes when we get older balance.

 

A lot of people struggle with balance, and it can lead to fairly dangerous falls and injuries.

 

By doing balancing exercises and incorporating them into your workout programs, it will help keep that balance throughout your everyday life.

 

Balance issues are one of the most common complaints we get on a day-to-day basis in our physical therapy clinic and just by simply incorporating it into your workout routine, you can get ahead of the problem and prevent it from ever developing.

 

#5 Incorporate Hip Mobility/Strengthening Workouts

 

The last rule we are going to discuss is mobility and strengthening your mobility. Mobility something that really goes away as we get older as well and we made a video on mobility which you can watch by clicking here.

 

According to the CDC, regular mobility and activity help avoid the loss of strength and stamina that can accompany aging.

 

Make sure you check that out if you want to learn more about mobility and what it is and how to strengthen your mobility.

 

Conclusion:

 

So, recap on what we just learned about new rules for fitness and working out that change at the age of 50 is stretching is no longer an option, resistance training become the star of the show, to increase bone density, and also a higher resting metabolic rate.

 

We then have to incorporate balance exercises, focus on mobility, and incorporating high-intensity interval training for fat burning.

 

Hiring a personal trainer will make sure all your hard work and efforts into making a healthy life will not go wasted.

 

Back In Motion Physical Therapy & Performance offers personal training, group training, and fitness boot camps to help you achieve all your health and fitness goals.

 

Click here to arrange your free consultation.

 

 

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