As you age and move through the middle age  years of 50-70 years old, have you wondered what is the best type of exercise for you to do to maintain your muscle mass?

Doing nothing will see a definite loss of muscle mass and a weakening of muscle strength. If you walk you are adding a cardio component. If you are watching what you eat and reducing your intake to match activity levels, as well as walking, you may see a reduced loss of muscle mass. Doing some resistance training using bands or weights combined with healthy eating will see a definite reduction in muscle mass loss, and will keep your strength levels up.

An article from the IDEA website explains how this works and what the results of a large study carried out have found.

It highlights the need to do resistance training combined with healthy eating to maintain a healthy body weight.

Here is the article.

New Study: Weight Training vs. Cardio for Older Adults

Nov 22, 2017

Weight training or cardio? For older clients who are trying to slim down, pumping iron might be the way to go. A new study by researchers at Wake Forest University suggests that weight training combined with a low-calorie diet preserves much-needed lean muscle mass that can be lost when the diet is paired with cardio workouts.

The findings, “Effect of Exercise Type During Intentional Weight Loss on Body Composition in Older Adults with Obesity,” appeared in the November issue of the journal Obesity.

For 18 months, researchers studied 249 adults in their 60s who were overweight or obese. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three protocols: weight loss only, with no exercise regimen; weight loss plus cardio (walking); or weight loss plus resistance training.

Weight loss plus resistance training (in the form of weight machine workouts) resulted in less muscle loss than either weight loss plus walking or weight loss alone, yet fat loss was still significant in the resistance training group. Participants in this group lost about 17 pounds of fat, compared with 16 pounds in walkers and just 10 pounds in nonexercisers.

Muscle mass loss was about 4 pounds from weight loss plus walking compared with about 2 pounds each from weight loss alone and weight loss plus resistance training. Put another way, the percentage of weight loss coming from muscle mass was 20% with weight loss plus walking, 16% with weight loss alone, and 10% with weight loss plus resistance training.

Loss of fat was associated with faster walking speed, while loss of muscle was associated with reduced knee strength.

“A lot of older adults will walk as their exercise of choice,” said Kristen Beavers, assistant professor of health and exercise science at Wake Forest and lead author of the study. “But this research shows that if you’re worried about losing muscle, weight training can be the better option.”

IDEA Fit Tips, Volume 15, Issue 12

If you are interested in starting an exercise program with plenty of resistance work, one of my over 50’s classes will be ideal for you.

Give Jane a call on 021 781 938 to find out more.