my opinion
How have you guys/ladies modified your training to preserve joint heath as you've gotten older? I turned 50 this year and I'm quickly learning that my connective tissue (especially tendons) can't handle the heavy weights like I used to. Torn shoulder tendons, bulging discs, arthritis in the right knee...it goes on and on
I love the gym and everything about it. It's a lifestyle I want to continue into my 80's god willing but these injuries as of late are just depressing the hell out of me.
My opinion and my experience with others is that eventually, as you age
you pay for the indiscretions of your youth. Youth if very forgiving of
‘errors’ (and as they say, is wasted on the young) and your over
overzealousness and or ignorance will, eventually, to most everybody,
come back to haunt you.
The powerlifters, Olympic lifters (those two especially) are the worst
‘offenders’ with bodybuilders, now especially as the heavy usage of
PEDS building strength faster than the connective tissue; ligaments and
tendons are able to cope with, are a close second. Unfortunately most
of the damage that was accomplished(?) in our youth was well disguised
or ignored and sadly cannot be undone leaving surgical intervention
often times, being our only source of relief.
I am 64 now and started lifting when I was 18 years old. I would like
to think I was wise in my youth which accounts for my zero aches and
pains or structural damage (did not use AAS, now on TRT) but I had
an excellent mentor that taught me to avoid explosive movements,
control the weight -- don’t let the weight control you, and use
relatively high repetitions while not increasing the resistance too
frequently and to move at a fast pace (not movement) through your
workout. I rarely, if ever, tried to see how much I could lift for a
maximum of 1 rep. I am not that kind of guy.
Also, I my weight never yo-yoed up and down which is one of the
things that is really bad for you, really hard on your joints when heavy
and fucks up your metabolism and so called set points, only to rear
its ugly head later in life when to try to return to some sort of normalcy.
I feel bad for the guys here that keep doing this to themselves; get fat,
get lean, get fat, get lean, ad nauseam, especially if they use fat burners.
Just wait I think to myself (here, now); before you know it, it will it
will be too late to turn back the hands of time having done irreversible
‘damage’ to your metabolism and where you store fat. Stay as lean
as you can possibly be while slowly increasing muscle mass. That has
been my mantra.
But I digress . . . sorry.
Finally, I think is only natural for the ageing process to be in some
ways ‘depressing’ especially if you have injuries that may or may not
be healing or correctable and especially, if after having been obsessed
with oneself for so long (not speaking to you directly, only to the
bodybuilding culture in general) only to see the irreversible, slow
decline as you age, when comparing the now to the what was. The
bigger the delta the stronger the emotions. Few people get that,
hence the rise in the masters division . . . old(er) people chasing their
long lost youth.
Train sensibly, eat right, get what you can fixed and make the best
of what you got. And be happy with it . . . which is easier said than
done I know. But you have no other choice in my opinion.
I wish you nothing but the best moving forward. Stay well.