Happy New Year KCFit.net members!

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by Chris Culbertson, posted Jul 29th 2008, 19:53

Guest Blog by Dr. Steven Aldana of WellSteps (Originally posted in Interesting Info on 1/16/2008)

Happy New Year KCFit.net members! The turning of the calendar generates lots of resolutions this time of year. I’ve got a few of my own, but first I was really heartened by the story of Russell Coffey who passed away a few weeks ago. Russell was the oldest U.S. veteran when he died. His health was exceptional his entire life and only began to fail in October. According to the AP story, Mr. Coffey was born Sept. 1, 1898, played semipro baseball, earned a doctorate in education and raised a family. He drove his car until he was 104, and lived in his own home until a year later. He credited healthy eating and exercise for his longevity.

What a terrific story! I’ve often joked that I would like to pass away at age 90 in a snowboarding accident. Although, Mr. Coffey’s story is exceptional in that he lived a “well” life for over 109 years, it should be more common place. Adopting a lifestyle of healthy eating and exercise should create a life wherein our degree of health is maintained for a longer than average span with a sudden decline as we approach our demise. Unfortunately, what we observe in our country is often a shorter than should be life, with a prolonged “un-well” period of years and years before we succumb.

So let’s talk about the new year- 2008- and our resolve. As Mr. Coffey noted, exercise is so vital to our health. In my book, The Culprit and the Cure, I wrote about “Mike.” Mike played a few sports in high school, but when he graduated, he took a desk job. Every day Mike slaved away at his computer and shuffled paper. Each day, the muscles in his arms and legs slowly weakened and mostly disappeared. One hot summer day, the water bottle on the office cooler ran dry so Mike decided to change out the bottles. He lifted the full bottle of water (about 40 pounds) on to his shoulder. Instead of placing it into position, he strained under the weight and collapsed to the floor, embarrassed.

Mike’s sedentary lifestyle and job contributed to his muscle weakness. He had difficulty carrying luggage or shoveling snow, and he tried quickly when playing with his toddler son. Contrary to what you have heard, his muscles didn’t turn to fat. His muscles simply got smaller and weaker, and he gained weight in the obvious places-around his stomach, hips, and thighs.

The loss of muscle not only reduced his strength, but it also reduced the number of calories his body burned throughout the day. Muscle is a contractile tissue that requires energy 24 hours a day just to exist. Forty-five percent of the body weight of an adult is muscle mass; the typical adult has 50-70 pounds of muscle. Each pound of muscle uses about 25 calories every day. That may not seem like much, but over a month or year, it adds up. That’s why having muscle helps prevent weight gain. Losing muscle makes you more likely to gain weight. It also makes you less able to perform basic physical functions when you become elderly. I never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Coffey, but his picture indicates that he was trim and fit man even in his 109th year.

Since fitness declines with age, researchers originally speculated that muscle strength might decline with age, but this is not true. After age 20, most adults lose about one half pound of muscle every year. At age 65, most will have lost 25% of their peak muscle strength. But unlike fitness, loss of muscle comes from disuse, not the aging process. Studies have shown that men in their 60s and 70s who strength train and exercise regularly have muscles that look and perform as well as those of inactive men in their 20s and 30s. Just getting older doesn\’t mean you have to give up muscle strength and the benefits of being strong.

So here are a few suggestions or “resolutions” you might consider:
- At least twice a week do some strength training
- Work all the major muscle groups- your arms, chest shoulders, abdomen, back and legs
- Repeat each exercise 10-15 times
- If you don’t have access to weight room, work against resistance- sit-ups and push-ups are great exercises. Free weights, barbells, resistance bands and exercising in water also provide good resistance. Maintain leg strength by jogging, aerobics, climbing stairs, bicycling, yoga or walking.
- Strength improvement will require at least 6 weeks and you’ll experience a gain of 20-40% after several months.
- If you plan to go to the gym with weight training equipment, ask trainers for assistance with machines. And go easy the first time.

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