Last week, I had a couple of old friends drop in on me for
dinner. As usual, it only took a little bit of time before
the conversation turned to nutrition and working out.
One of my friends was in his late 50's. He has always been
in great shape. He maintains a great workout program and
always pays attention to what he eats. Yet, on this
particular visit, he seemed a little discouraged with his
progress.
After a little bit of prying I found out why. He had been
out having dinner with several of his friends who were all
medical doctors and they were "on him" about working out.
Turns out these three highly educated individuals were
trying to convince my friend that it was physically
impossible to put on muscle once you pass fifty years of
age. They told him that it had something to do with his
hormone levels and lack of testosterone.
No wonder he was discouraged!
Thankfully, in no way is any of this true. Here's a great
example for you to consider.
In a research trial conducted on people who were over 50
years old and had chronic renal insufficiency (real bad
kidneys) researchers explored the idea that resistance
training could counteract the low protein diets that these
people had to be on because of their medical condition.
On average these subject were eating under 0.3 grams of
protein per pound of body weight. To put that into
perspective, a 180 pound man would be eating about 50 grams
of protein per day! For 12 weeks!
So what the researchers were thinking was 'since these
people were on such low protein diets, for extended periods
of time, muscle loss is definitely a risk. However, maybe
if we made them weight train, we could prevent this from
happening'.
Sounds like a good idea to me.
At the end of the study, the subject working out 3 times
per week maintained there body weight, while the group that
was not lifting weights lost about 7 pounds.
The group lifting weights also saw increases in muscle
strength and muscle size. While the group not weight
training lost some muscle and a little bit of strength.
This study is a great example of people over 50 actually
gaining muscle size as a result of resistance training.
And, they didnt even have to follow some crazy high protein
diet to do it!
This research shows that you can be over 50 and still build
a significant amount of muscle with relatively low protein
intakes (the amount you get from your food in the average
north american diet) as long as you are lifting weights.
When it comes to muscle - Use it or lose it. That's the
bottom line. There is no truth to the saying that you can't
build muscle over a certain age. People in their 70's can
build muscle with weight training.
----------------------------------------------------
Brad Pilon is a strength training and nutrition
professional and author of Eat Stop Eat. You can learn
about his new book "Eat Stop Eat" that is quickly changing
the way people think about dieting, by visiting
http://www.eatstopeat.com Brad Pilon is an expert
contributor at eFit-Today
http://www.efit-today.com/public/department59.cfm
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