Your body changes as the decades advanced, but your muscles can still stay strong if you work out regularly. Personal trainer and nutritionist, Paul Snowsell of www.paulsabsolutefitness.com offers some tips to help you stay lean and mean, as you get older.
In your 30s: Just because you haven’t got the metabolism you had in your late teens and early twenties, when you could eat pretty much whatever you liked without putting on a pound, you can still put through its paces. I often recommend clients to consider interval training as a way of fighting that common fear of getting fat.
Focus on putting your body through short sharp intense blasts of high intensity activity. This can be done on the treadmill starting with 30-second sprints on a small incline with a rest period of 30 seconds walking on a flat. Continue this for around 20 minutes. This will get your heart rate up high elevated in the fat burning zone and it stay High even in the recovery periods.
In your 40s: After the age of 40 women lose 1% bone density each year, putting their body at risk of osteoporosis. Resistance training is a fantastic way to help prevent this as it helps increase bone density. Why not try a full body resistance programme that concentrates on compound movements?
To tone the upper body:
Chest press with dumbbells (2 sets of 15 x reps) – Lie on the bench with a dumbbell in each hand and your feet flat on the floor or rest your feet up on the bench if it’s more comfortable. Push the dumbbells up so that your arms are directly over your shoulders and your palms are facing up. Pull your abdominals in, and lower the dumbbells down until your elbows are slightly below your shoulders. Then push the weights back up ensuring you don’t lock your elbows and try to keep your shoulder blades on the bench.
To tone your legs and bum:
Side Lunges: (2 sets of 20 x reps on each leg) – Holding a pair of dumbbells, stand with your feet and knees together. Take a large step with your right foot to the right side and lunge toward the floor. Make sure your right knee does not extend past your toes and keep your left leg relatively straight. Push off through your right foot to return to the start to complete one. Lunges are often considered to be one of the best lower body exercises. The side lunge can effectively strengthen and tone inner thigh muscles.
Chair Squats: (2 sets of 15 x reps) – Stand in front of a sturdy chair, as if to sit. Place your feet about shoulder width apart, feet angled out slightly. Hold a dumbbell in each hand. If you’re new to squats, 5-pound dumbbells are good. As you get stronger, you can increase the weight accordingly. Bend your knees. Shift your hips back and slowly lower yourself down until your butt’s just about touching the chair, then stand back up. Don’t lock your knees. Keep them loose at all times. This is a big compound movement that primarily targets the thighs, hips, hamstrings and glutes. If you can’t feel the burn with this one, the key is to put your weight back into your heels and squat low and slow! This exercise is effective because it works so many muscle groups at one time. The more muscles you use, the more calories you burn.
For a flatter, stronger stomach and core
Plank: (try to hold for 30-60 seconds or as long as you can and increase the time as you feel yourself getting stronger). Start by getting into the push up position on the floor, then bend your elbows to 90 degrees and rest your body weight on your forearms. It’s important to ensure your elbows are directly under your shoulders while keeping a straight line from head to toe.
In your 50s and 60s: Unfortunately as we get older and fall into this age bracket, muscle growth becomes a lot more challenging. At this age it is important to keep muscles and joints, flexible, mobile and stable. I’d advise an exercise programme that firstly gently mobilises the joints, strengthens them through stability and balance exercises and most importantly stretches them to gradually lengthen muscles and keep flexible. I would suggest doing regular Pilates, Yoga or Body Balance classes.
Comments are closed.