Fitness Over 50
Complete Step-by-Step Guide to Become Lean, Muscular and In the Best Shape Ever With an Exact Weekly Workout Plan
Stanford Dyson
Table of Contents
Introduction
How to be in the Best Shape Ever After the Age of 50
Congratulations on purchasing Fitness Over 50, and thank you for doing so.
The following chapters will discuss how you can be in the best shape ever after the age of 50. Failing to stay in shape as you age can predispose you to obesity, increasing your risk factors for heart disease and diabetes. These increase your chance of loss of memory and other cognition skills that are the real fear factors of aging.
You can age gracefully. You can maintain a youthful faade both physically and mentally. How? Exercise is the key. A healthy diet is its helpmate.
Think of this book as the master lock and key to your continuing youthfulness. It will give you the guidance you need to be in the best shape possible, whether youve neglected your body for years or youre trying to maintain what youve always considered your sacred temple.
In these pages, youll find the three most important exercises to a quick, full-body workout. Youll learn how and when to increase weight or distance. Youll understand how to prevent injury. And how to recover if the unfortunate should occur.
Youll learn how to eat your way to health to maintain a youthful physique. Youll also learn that a guide like this can be your best friend. You may even want to share it but only with a best friend you trust wont steal your woman cause these tips will make any man an animal even after hes passed the big 5-O.
There are plenty of books on this subject on the market. This is the one youre going to keep. Thanks again for choosing this one! Every effort was made to ensure it is full of as much useful information as possible. Please enjoy!
Chapter 1: Fitness for EVERYONE
Why Exercise Is Essential to Good Health
Hopefully, youve stayed fit, and this will be addressing the changes your body has made now that youre over 50. Maybe youve neglected yourself, and you need to re-start a fitness routine cause now youve hit the big 5-0! Maybe youve never had to exercise before, but now that youve hit that number that you cant deny is on the downhill slide, you know you cant avoid it anymore. Its time to EXERCISE!
Dont Worry: Its not as bad as you think. Fitness doesnt have to be a chore no matter how old you are or your current physical state. Youre going to find tips and techniques here that will help working out feel like fun.
Exercise is essential to your good health. After 50, it becomes harder to rein in your physical fitness, if youve neglected it. Not impossible, just harder. The benefits become more and more crucial.
After 50, weight gain becomes more prevalent. We tend to gain weight at a rate of about 1 to 2 pounds per year every year past the age of 30. Thats as much as 40 pounds by the time were 50. And were going to keep packing them on.
What contributes to that weight gain? After age 30 (again), muscle starts to turn to fat if you dont work it. That accelerates at age 60, so you really want to combat that in these last years before you meet that age marker. Fat requires less energy for the body to operate than muscle. If you dont take in fewer calories to compensate for the lower energy requirements, you gain weight.
Fat turnover (how quickly fat is removed from your body) also slows with age. But exercise particularly strength training or resistance exercises helps to stimulate your muscles. To maintain muscle, you need to eat a higher protein diet as well.
Another contributor to weight increase with age is that testosterone that regulates muscle mass and fat distribution begins to drop at around 40 years of age.
What else increases weight with age? Lower muscle mass often contributes to a more sedentary lifestyle with aging. Stress increases cortisol that increases body fat. Metabolism slows and becomes less efficient. Again, strength training can help compensate for all three of these.
Another important reason to exercise is that it boosts your mood. No matter what your situation in life, being in a better mood is a benefit. Exercise helps with that.
Whether youre currently practicing good health and fitness, or you need to start from a sedentary lifestyle, its time to assess your current fitness level.
How to Assess Your Current Fitness Level
Getting a Physical
Normal blood pressure is 120 or less over 80 or less. If your blood pressure is 130 over 80 or higher, you have hypertension. Discuss this condition with your doctor and decided whether it is safe for you to proceed with an exercise program or not. And what, if any, precautions you should take.
- Your heart rate should be between 50 and 100, though many healthy people have slower heart rates.
- Respiration rate is considered normal with breaths that are 12 to 16 per minute. Twenty breaths per minute might mean a heart or lung problem that your doctor will discuss with you. Be sure to ask whether or not it is safe for you to proceed with an exercise program and how you should modify it, if necessary.
- Your doctor will listen to your heart for an irregular beat, a murmur, or any other signs of heart disease. These may also be indicated by blood testing.
- Your lungs, too, will be listened to for crackles, wheezes, or other indications of lung disease.
- A routine head and neck exam will be performed to view your eyes, ears, nose, throat, sinuses, lymph nodes, thyroid, and carotid arteries.
- The abdominal exam will help detect your liver size, presence of abdominal fluid, or tenderness, and a stethoscope will help listen for bowel sounds.
- Your doctor will also test your reflexes, balance, mental state, nerves, and muscle strength (squeeze my finger as tight as you can).
- A skin exam should be included in your physical, and this includes an examination of your nails.
- Your joints and extremities will be examined for good pulsation and any possible abnormalities. Arthritis may be setting in by this age.
- During your testicular exam, your doctor can check for lumps, tenderness, or changes in size. Most men notice a cancerous growth before seeing their doctor.
- A hernia exam is when your doctor will say, turn your head and cough while checking for abdominal wall weakness between the intestines and the scrotum.
- A penis exam can reveal warts or ulcers or other evidence of sexually transmitted infection.
- By inserting a finger in the rectum, your doctor can examine your prostate for the correct size and shape.
- In addition to the physical examination, lab tests may be ordered to include complete blood count, chemistry panel, and urinalysis.
- If you havent had one in a while (recommendation is every 4 6 years), a lipid panel may be ordered to check cholesterol levels for an increased chance of stroke or heart attack.
- Blood sugar is more likely to be checked if you are overweight or have diabetes risk factors, though the American Diabetes Association recommends all adults over age 45 regardless of weight have it checked.
- Once you turn 50, you should begin having regular colorectal cancer screenings. If you have immediate family members who had it or you have other risk factors, that screening should be started sooner.