Comment by xtiansimon
7 hours ago
> “High-intensity training reduced fat and maintained lean mass […] though changes were small and not clinically meaningful compared with exercise of lower intensity…”
High intensity does border on leading to injury — just making the wrong move — and you’re back to zero intensity?
High intensity does border on leading to injury
Where are you getting this? The study was about various intensities of cardio - I didn't see it noted, but I'm guessing the high- and medium-intensity groups were on a treadmill, elliptical, or similar. Pretty small chance of injury for the durations they mention, especially as the subjects were monitored while exercising.
And I'm not really surprised by the study - building lean muscle mass takes resistance training, which wasn't part of the study. The study results appear to be inline with what was common knowledge/experience.
And if you're injuring yourself regularly during weight training or other gym activities, I'd suggest you might hire a good coach/trainer for guidance and programming, because that shouldn't happen either.
> And if you're injuring yourself regularly during weight training or other gym activities, I'd suggest you might hire a good coach/trainer for guidance and programming, because that shouldn't happen either.
After a certain age, it's difficult to train somewhat intensely without risking injury. You can always find some exercises that work and maintain a physical activity, but this may not be enough to maintain your muscle mass or your stamina.
Sure, thus the "find a trainer" suggestion. :shrug: You aren't wrong, but for somebody who has been active and healthy, intense exercise deep into their 60s should be possible.
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This is specifically cardio. High intensity interval training can be safe, for example, air bike, battle ropes, etc. High intensity running does have higher injury risk.
Everyone just needs to play soccer and avoid the 50/50s if you're an adult that wants to be pain free the next day.
I love me some adult coed soccer. And it can be very high intensity intermittently if you feel like it.
The study is about 70 year olds. I’m not sure it’s a good idea for the average 70 year old to be engaging in contact sports…
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I avoided - or that was my intention until the game started - the 50/50s but my calf and hamstring still felt the pain the next day Totally worth it though
Hurting the ego will likely make you not play the next game
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Really depends on how you define high-intensity.
To build muscle, you need to push yourself to a limit. You can reduce the weight and increase the repetitions. This approach is just as effective and lowers the risk of injury.
Maybe with older adults the baseline goal should be to merely maintain or slow the loss of the muscle, mobility, and cardiovascular capacity they already have? It's not realistic for a 50 year old to think they could build muscle year-after-year for the next 30 years.
For the next 30 years, probably not, but mostly because you can get really strong really quickly, as most adults are really weak.
It's not that unusual for people to pick up e.g. powerlifting past 50 and still get to levels well beyond what most younger adults can lift.
I'm 51, and recently back into powerlifting after many years out of it, and I certainly expect to build back muscle and improving week over week for many years before I can't stem the decline any more, as long as avoid injury or health issues that takes me out of the gym - avoiding time off exercise is the biggest challenge with getting older.
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However, if you are a male and age 50 you can definitely expect to still build muscle up to 60 if you are diligent with your strength training. You can maintain mass 60-70. You do need a little more protein. I collected as much proven data and studies on this as I could: https://stealthgoat.com/building-muscle.html
This is what I do. When I was beginning with weight training, I followed other's recommendations back then and pushed hard. Had quite often minor issues or injuries in the joints which set me back for weeks or even months, my tendons seem to be my weak spot and it does get worse with age, both limits and recovery.
Lowered the load, increased repetitions and basically nothing for a decade. I can still go almost to the failure, I don't even want to reach it since I don't care about that extra bit. Squats or deadlifts are hard even when not at limits, one feels used body parts for a day or two.
I still add cardio on top of that, its just basic logic of moving around a lot is very good for the body, even if effects are not immediately obvious.
> Squats or deadlifts are hard even when not at limits, one feels used body parts for a day or two.
That’s just regular ‘ol DOMS and not a problem.
Tendons tend to respond well to both heavy load or high reps, albeit adaptation in either case is very slow.
So, how many reps did you start with and how many do you do nowadays?
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Well, your body knows nothing about number of reps or the weights. You can also do your reps slower.
You just need to build back up to high intensity training over time by consistently exercising and pushing yourself. Injury comes from pushing yourself too hard too soon. Unless you are approaching 50 (and even then) you can recover most of your fitness from your early 20s.
No joke. I go to the gym a couple times a week so that I'll maintain mobility and won't injure myself as I age - unfortunately 80% of my injuries come from the gym.
If most of your injuries come from the gym, I recommend you get a trainer.
hahah, so true. Also, there are multiple ways to do high intensity exercising that are very unlikely to injure you, like stationary bikes. High intensity only means going to a very high heart rate, you can do this in any way you like it.
This is highly unusual. You shouldn’t be injuring yourself that frequently at the gym, especially if your goal Is just to maintain mobility and basic muscle mass as you age.
This is such a strange thing to hear, as someone who also has gone to the gym a couple times per week for my life with a lot of different gym buddies.
I would suggest considering a reset of your gym routine and gym knowledge, possibly with the help of a physical therapist to see what you’re doing wrong.
If you’re going to one of those gyms that encourage dumb things like doing heavy lifts in a timed competition format or other bad ideas that were trendy in the 2010s, I really recommend getting out of those environments.
My experience is that every movement pattern causes "injuries" like a sore tendon, wrenched back, inflamed shoulder that surface with every 20 pounds of added weight until I figure out what about my form is incorrect. Usually not something a trainer would see like "don't flare your elbows", internal stuff like "use your glute medius to help push" or "elbows in line with the torso on squats" that might be in 1 of 20 YouTube videos.
I use the weight training to surface the injuries to make me aware of what I'm doing wrong in daily movements. I might finally be past this and able to just go in and push weights but it's taken years. I feel like it's down to the body I'm living in and what I consider a pain threshold, not any risk taking or lack of information.
Only the 80% number was given. If he has been going to the gym for 30 years and had 5 injures at the gym, one outside that would be incredibly low for a total, and that level of carelessness at the gym is lower than I'd expect. If his routine was over 1 month then there are big problems.
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Lift less weight then, there is no reason to get injured in the gym if you have a normal body, proper form and lift reasonable weight. From an health point of view it's better to squat/deadlift a mere 60kg safely than trying to go for 200kg+ and snap a disk for absolutely no reason. 100% of my injuries are gym related, because I threw my back exactly once, and since then I lift reasonable weights and focus on proper execution/form
Some people believe "high intensity" means lifting as much as possible as fast as possible, I'd say more reps and deliberately slow movements are as intense for the purpose of staying in shape/healthy.
Most body weight exercises are virtually impossible to fuck up to the point of injury, done properly they'll keep you fitter than 99% of the population
80% of my injuries occurred while sleeping, which seems very weird.
The neck is quite vulnerable during sleep and could lead to neck muscle injuries that leave one with a stiff neck for days.
I knew someone who dislocated her shoulder often while sleeping. If I remember right, she's dislocated it 17 times or some ridiculous number.
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Are you hypermobile?
My son is and once subluxed his shoulder while running
There are plenty of high intensity activities with low risk of injury. Rowing and swimming come to mind.
I think the bigger problem is that, as far as I can tell, very few people have the appropriate personality type for high intensity exercise. Most people seem to experience it just as pointless discomfort.
There is no correlation between exercise intensity and likelihood of injury, this is nonsense. You could e.g. just as well make one wrong move when going for a one rep max.
Going for one rep max is intense. If it weren't, you could get a better max.
In my experience, there's a middle ground. Don't go for 1 to 3 rep maxes. Go for 4-6 rep maxes for a set and then follow it by set to failure in the 8-12 rep range. That gives a good mix of both intensity and volume while still reducing risks of injury as the weights are heavy but not crazy heavy to compromise form.
Calisthenics is a really easy way to push intensity at basically 0 risk of injury. They're all compound and depending on the variation could require high reps, but between push ups, pull-ups, squats, their numerous variations, and accessory work, I would challenge anyone to actually injure themselves while also being able to push to true technical failure.
It is very possible to injure yourself with calisthenics. Shoulder impingement or tendinitis from pullups with too much intensity/bad form for example. Weight is weight.
Ugh, tendonitis recovery is so slow and annoying in middle age. I had to stop training pull-ups for the best part of a year. Starting again now, but easing in gently as I'm very motivated to not have that again. I'm 220lb/100kg so even if strong enough that's a lot of weight on unadapted tendons.
This is not good advice and please remove the “basically 0 risk of injury” wording. Mobility is a limiting factor and poor body positioning WILL result in injury. Barbells are safe, progressively overloadable, and learning to move them is a straight line is what most people need to do before a lot of calisthenics training. Most people can’t even do 1 pull up.
From my son's experience in calisthenics and looking around at the group he sometimes trains with, there are definitely a lot of overload/overuse injuries, at a range from just needing rest to bicep tears.
Lots of overuse injuries in calisthenics:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.2147/OAJSM.S394044
Poor form is possible with calisthenics and that leads to injuries or other problems.