What's your fitness age?

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
61

Thought this story belongs here.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/at-93-he-s-as-fit-as-a-40-year-old-his-body-offers-lessons-on-aging/ar-AA1n3CkD

At 93, the Irishman is a four-time world champion in indoor rowing, with the aerobic engine of a healthy 30- or 40-year-old and the body-fat percentage of a whippet. He’s also the subject of a new case study, published last month in the Journal of Applied Physiology, that looked at his training, diet and physiology.

he’s ordinary: a onetime baker and battery maker with creaky knees who didn’t take up regular exercise until he was in his 70s and who still trains mostly in his backyard shed.

It’s never to late to begin exercising.

Even though his fitness routine began later in life, he has now rowed the equivalent of almost 10 times around the globe and has won four world championships. So what, the researchers wondered, did his late-life exercise do for his aging body?

They put the geezer on a rowing machine monitored him.

Morgan proved to be a nonagenarian powerhouse, his sinewy 165 pounds composed of about 80 percent muscle and barely 15 percent fat, a body composition that would be considered healthy for a man decades younger.

During the time trial, his heart rate peaked at 153 beats per minute, well above the expected maximum heart rate for his age and among the highest peaks ever recorded for someone in their 90s, the researchers believe, signaling a very strong heart.

His heart rate also headed toward this peak very quickly, meaning his heart was able to rapidly supply his working muscles with oxygen and fuel. These “oxygen uptake kinetics,” a key indicator of cardiovascular health, proved comparable to those of a typical, healthy 30- or 40-year-old, Daly said.

I suspect Morgan does have any cardiac problems or history. But any human benefits from getting off their keister and moving around. Morgan just took it to an extreme level.

His regime:

  • Consistency: Every week, he rows about 30 kilometers (about 18.5 miles), averaging around 40 minutes a day.
  • A mix of easy, moderate and intense training: About 70 percent of these workouts are easy, with Morgan hardly laboring. Another 20 percent are at a difficult but tolerable pace, and the final 10 at an all-out, barely sustainable intensity.
  • Weight training: Two or three times a week, he also weight-trains, using adjustable dumbbells to complete about three sets of lunges and curls, repeating each move until his muscles are too tired to continue.
  • A high-protein diet: He eats plenty of protein, his daily consumption regularly exceeding the usual dietary recommendation of about 60 grams of protein for someone of his weight.

Morgan is an inspiration. But I will stick to my 2 mile a day walking regime.

2 Likes
62

Interesting article. Thanks. A couple of my classmembers when I taught at a gym in Brookline (Boston) were serious former boaties and now Concept 2/C.R.A.S.H-B sprint competitors (the photo in the article). I always fancied giving it a shot but that particular gym didn’t have any ergs and I didn’t want to spring for the cost of one, like they had.

Edit…reading the story, it reminded me of this YouTube vid that’s come up at Christmas the last couple years…

Also, another example of following up on serendipity…a group of researchers are interested in the biology of healthy aging and someone in the group mentions his old granddad, and the rest is a really neat research project

1 Like
63

" Concept 2/C.R.A.S.H-B sprint competitors"

I’ve had a Concept-2 Ski Erg for about a decade. Ski Erg is a lot like the rower, except one is standing while using it, it works the whole body ( as I know the rower does, also ). I use it at the same 3 different exertion levels as the 93 year old. At the hiit rate, it is absolutely brutally hard. the military or CIA could rig it up to torture suspects when they let the wattage fall below a certain level,lol. It is mentally hard to do an hour on it, always have music or a podcast going in the background. It is definitely much, much more fun to be doing stuff outdoors as compared to the Ski-Erg, but it is a great machine.

1 Like
64

I imagine that Concept puts out the same motivational/marketing stuff for the ski erg as the rower? That stuff was great. Lots of freebies for gyms/fitness instructors to raise interest/awareness/spending.

One big, spanking new gym chain I worked for on LI had 5 rowers in a sort of out-of-the-way spot. Along with a few athletically inclined class members, we’d use these after a regular class (pre planned so we weren’t too spanked to do them justice) Just for the asking, Concept sent me a whole load of technique and training DVDs and whatnot to accompany all the stuff on the Concept website. I actually quite fancied the real thing but it kind of needs a club to join and water, of course. My daughter took up crew when she went off to college and got pretty good but, out on The Charles one day, the boat actually bumped into a dead body. It was never the same after that.

65

@AlphaWolf

I said it with you in mind.

:kissing_heart:

1 Like
66

@VeeEnn
You had to show that ad.

67

It’s a tear jerker, ain’t it. On the occasions my granddaughter asks “What you doing that for, grandma?”, when I’m doing some random exercise or other, I’ll often reply “So I can lift your little girl up above my head”.

She’s not going to have any children…reckons they’re too much bother. The basic principle’s there, though.

1 Like
68

“I imagine that Concept puts out the same motivational/marketing stuff for the ski erg as the rower?”

My intro to ski-erg was via another skier. Like everybody else, when I 1st started skate skiing, the climbs were just brutally hard ( they’re still real hard, but am going faster up them ), and I was told that I could get a whole lot stronger by practicing double-poling on Erg in the off season, even though it wasn’t uphill. Put it on the highest setting, or near that, and it feels like it’s uphill, lol. Hopefully winter sticks around, and I won’t be back on the ski-erg until a rainy day in May.

Concept-2 had a website where you could log times over different distances, don’t know if they meant for that to be marketing, but it was highly motivating. I stopped logging times because I was using bad form to get fast times, and my back was getting sore doing it. So I focus on good technique, don’t worry about time competitions against others.

69

It is an accurate statement and has been the basis for many publications on many different animal species.

Under most circumstances heart rate (f(H)) is correlated with the rate of oxygen consumption (VO(2)) and hence the rate of energy expenditure or metabolic rate (MR). For over 60 years this simple principle has underpinned the use of heart rate to estimate metabolic rate in a range of animal species and to answer questions about their physiology, behaviour and ecology. The heart rate method can be applied both quantitatively and qualitatively. The heart rate method for estimating metabolic rate: review and recommendations - PubMed

Let me try to better explain my position and perhaps find a common understanding.

You focus your discussion on BMR, which is a special case metabolism representing the minimum activity required to maintain only vital functions. In the absence of physical activity, energy use is mostly limited to cellular processes, with muscle cells using more energy than fat cells. The only active muscle is the heart and the amount of energy it uses during BMR is dependent on the resting heart rate (RHR). This energy use is a minor component but measurable.

I believe runners who don’t monitor their diet generally do not lose weight because they end up eating as many calories as they burn. In addition, running does not build muscle mass but it does make the heart more efficient at pumping. This means heart rate declines while the percent muscle stays the same. This results in a small decline in BMR due to a more efficient heart with all else unchanged. In short, RHR declines as does BMR. Correlation!

If we now add physical activity to the equation, both exercise and non-exercise, we find that such activity increases both energy use and heart rate. Heart rate increases as does metabolism. Correlation!

Of course, RHR and BMR don’t have to correlate, I think this is your point. Going back to runners, if one combines running with diet monitoring, one can improve cardiovascular fitness (reduce RHR) while also reducing fat and thereby increasing the muscle/fat ratio (increase BMR). That’s how one can sustainably lose weight running, but it requires some monitoring of diet.

1 Like
70

No…mistake(s)!

Although running alone generally isn’t gifted with building muscle mass, that doesn’t mean that the resulting skeletal muscle and other systems remain in the same state as in a Sedentarian or utilizes the same amount of energy at rest. The basic repair processes that have folk coming back stronger as training progresses demand energy over and above baseline.

Now with endurance training, improved fitness and the resultant drop in resting heart rate, the heart doesn’t just beat more slowly (and economise on energy expenditure by that route) but also more forcefully with every beat (for reasons already mentioned…greater blood volume, increased parasympathetic drive, and all those changes detailed in the Wikipedia explanation and any exercise physiology text you might care to consult) A lower RHR does not signify a lower metabolic rate for this, and a good many other, reasons.

Now, an increase in heart rate response to an increase in energy demand via exercise is used for a proxy for relative intensity…that’s how heart rate monitors entered the sports field (developed and promoted by Polar Electro for use with the Finnish Cross Country team in the 1970s…I was a Polar rep for a while) Problem with this as a proxy for energy expenditure is that it doesn’t necessarily correspond with cardiac output and thus blood/nutrients/oxygen to exercising muscles and, as mentioned upstream plays less of a direct role with improved fitness. So one would appear to burn fewer calories if using the information from a heart rate monitor as that happens (always a disappointment to see…until one accepts that initial supernova burn rate was a bit of an exaggeration. Yes, I’ve made a good few of these rudimentary mistakes along the way.)

Using your logic…that as runners get fitter they expend less energy and so have an increased potential to get fatter…well, I’m sure they do. But only if they continue at the slow sustainable pace they started at when they began ( I’ve personally never encountered any who’ve wanted to do that) … …and overeat, of course. That’ll always make you fat.

What folk do when they start a training programme that’s intelligently designed…regardless of mode of exercise…is to start of at a pace/power output that’s sustainable. If using a heart rate monitored approach, something that toggles around 70% of their Max HR give or take. Let’s say for the average Joe/Josephine a walking speed on the flat or treadmill might have them settling at around 130-135 bpm at a mere 3.5 mph…possibly even less if seriously deconditioned. Now, consistency in this over just a few weeks should have that heart rate at 3.5 mph starting to drop (and corresponding RPE…i.e., it starts to feel easier) all being well…possibly even RHR too. Now the logical inference to me would be “Oh, I can work a bit harder for the same moderate challenge” and do so…walking faster, generating an increase in Metabolic Equivalent of Task and burning more energy in the process.

Successful weight management always requires some degree of dietary accountability…seated, standing or running. Exceed total daily energy expenditure consistently, and weight gain is usually a guarantee. And vice versa.

1 Like
71

Dietary accountability in the modern age is easier for some of us with probiotics. Things are way off kilter for most of us.

72

This was a dangerous thread/post for me to read…in my incapacitated state and Retail Therapy on my mind!

It’s just coming up to the 5 year anniversary of my husband’s open heart surgery and cardiac rehab follow up. I’d made my mind up that I wasn’t going to let him squander the hard work of his surgical team and everyone involved’s excellent care so, knowing that he’d baulk at the gym and he didn’t like my bike/trainer set up, I/we opted for a treadmill. I really would’ve preferred a rower but given how long the healing process for the thoracotomy was likely to take, I settled for the tread.

Been well worth the investment and then some. But now my appetite has been whetted by that ski-erg, and it looks like it could be rigged to have a small footprint?

73

Didn’t you just start the probiotics last week? Are they already working for you regarding dietary accountability? Wow!

74

“by that ski-erg, and it looks like it could be rigged to have a small footprint?”

the base platform that you stand on is 4 foot long by 2 foot wide, and it is 7 foot high.

Can fit a bosu ball on the 4x2 base if you want to play around with balance drills. I’m glad I got it, get quite a bit of use out of it. It’s real good for building xc ski strength, double poling is a fundamental movement, the stronger one is at that, the more fun they’ll have on the trails.

75

Exactly! Focusing on volitional exercise or NEAT alone will not lead to sustainable weight loss without monitoring what is eaten.

Not exactly.

The human body is very good at maintaining weight. That makes sustainably losing weight difficult. It goes like this. Recent studies indicate that on average, there isn’t much difference in the daily energy burned by a couch potato versus a fit runner.

This is because the body compensates for the additional energy used for exercise by lowering resting metabolic activity. In effect, the body becomes more efficient at using energy.

Suppose a person starts to run 10 miles/week. This increase in activity increases the total energy expenditure of the runner. If the runner’s diet remains unchanged (difficult to do because of the increase in appetite) there will be a loss of weight. However, after a few weeks of running the body further compensates by reducing the resting metabolic rate, a consequence of becoming “fit”. This means that the runner’s total energy expenditure returns to what it was before the running program. If the runner’s diet still hasn’t changed, then the runner will regain the weight lost.

The evidence for this was popularized in a recent book and is nicely summarized by a Canadian running magazine:

1 Like
76

Yes and Yes

The above is mostly the truth. You’d need to pay for the classes. This is a small series of three videos. The Masterclasses do not generally focus on gut health.

I am doing a lot of the things in this. Some are carefully bought outside the home. I do take a probiotic from 365 to enhance the process.

I immediately felt better and began to lose weight. There is evidence that probiotics can cut some people’s hunger down. I am a lot less hungry. I am often satiated at times I least expect it.

Some of the things I eat, are sauerkraut, kefir, pickles, kombucha, and yogurt…

77

No our society is very good at adding weight. Not so good at putting us in positions where many of us go hungry. Our society is terrible at nurturing our health. In the sciences, we are overcoming some of that with healthcare.

78

Our society is very good at providing choices. We choose to get fat.

No one is forcing people to eat Cheetos and drink soda.

1 Like
79

Aah…the reasons for your confusion are getting a bit clearer.

To your first point, if you scroll back to the early mentions of NEAT, you (and anyone else who cares to check) will see that no one was claiming that exercise alone would automatically lead to weight loss. A bit of a Straw Man argument, really, as my reference to NEAT was in the context of compensatory change in energy expenditure from this source…both with more volitional exercise or reduced energy intake. Referencing the dynamic nature of the CI:CO equation…and, by implication, the reasonable confusion of folk who’re looking to lose weight by either dieting or exercise to create an energy deficit and seeing anomalous (usually disappointing) results.

80

Oops, sent that last post off prematurely.

I seriously doubt there are too many reproducible studies showing no difference in daily energy expenditure between a couch potato and a fit runner…primarily because fit runners don’t spend much time in the couch and there is a measurable difference in workload and subsequent energy expenditure between those activities over a number of hours.

Now, to your example of the would be runner who starts off with 10 miles of running a week. As you point out, if all other things remain equal…both eating habits (assuming weight stability before the start of training) and also the “organic” non volitional activity (NEAT)…a sustainable energy deficit will create weight loss. SUCCESS!! After a period of this successful weight loss there’s going to be an inevitable stall as that weight loss shows its impact…both in BMR because of loss of metabolically active tissue and a bit of down regulation of not so vital metabolic function (adaptive thermogenesis) and that less weighty body doesn’t have to expend so much energy for the 10 miles. As you rightly point out, though, for some folk using running or any other form of exercise to lose weight, increased hunger can cause compensatory increase in energy intake…just like creating a deficit by eating less can.

In comparison to the easily observed and measured changes in compensatory behaviour, a reduction in BMR is going to be so minimal that it can be overridden by conscious habits…reassessing new energy needs and eating a bit less, running a bit further and faster (made easier with new fitness level) and focusing on continued movement throughout the day.

1 Like