Sporty older people run marathons, cycle several hundred kilometres in races, swim across the English Channel, or jump from bridges. To ensure your health also cooperates in the long term, you need to keep your body busy and active in old age.

The achievements seem unbelievable. 70-year-old men run 42.195 kilometres under three hours, women the same age finish the Ironman in Hawaii or climb Mount Everest. Gone are the days when sprightly pensioners only went for walks or to senior gymnastics classes where they sat on rubbers ball gently circling their arms.

Sporty pensioners today seem to know no bounds and the age limits are blurred. However, it is not quite so simple. This is because the biological ageing process of humans has basically not changed, despite the significantly longer life expectancy. Although fit 50-year-olds are very reluctant to call themselves seniors, the physical fitness level continuously and significantly declines throughout life, and already starts at the age of 30.

At the age of 70, inactive people only have about the half of their former maximum performance capability. Those who do not actively counteract this will not only lose some quality of life, but also their mobility and independence in the long term. For many older people, these are all crucial prerequisites to stay motivated in life.

First the muscles shrink

The most dramatic reduction is that of physical strength. People already start losing muscle from the age of 20. Up until the age of 45, your strength decreases by around 5% each decade, after which it accelerates to around 10% each decade. You will thus lose up to 50% of your strength by the time you are 80.

It varies from person to person as to when and to what extent the muscles decrease. Besides genetic factors, sports plays a decisive role. With targeted muscle training, older people can maintain the level of people that do little training who are thirty years younger. And even 90-years-olds were able to demonstrate a 170% increase in strength through targeted training. For endurance athletes in general, the following applies: you should already get used to regular strength training at a young age.

Amazing endurance

The loss of endurance in old age is less noticeable than that of strength, if you take sporty measures to counteract it. There are 40-year-olds who are still world class endurance athletes. And at running, cycling, and cross-country skiing events, 60-year-olds achieve rankings in the first 5% of the overall ranking list or accomplish feats that seemed impossible before. However, from about 65, even the super fit experience a clear decrease in performance, even though their absolute achievements still seem incredible.

Gentle sports such as cycling, cross-country skiing, or swimming and hiking are ideal for endurance. Lifelong endurance training strengthens the cardiovascular system in such a way that an Ironman or running a marathon is also not impossible for 80 or even 90-year-olds – if their musculoskeletal systems cooperate.

Sports activities transform

If you don’t do sports, however, your endurance performance will also decline enormously in old age – at around 15 percent each decade. What automatically (unfortunately) considerably increases with old age are visual, hearing, balance and gait disorders. Besides strength and endurance, a person’s performance capability and desired long-term independence are still therefore linked to three other fitness factors that need to be supported on a regular basis: flexibility, coordination and speed or speed-strength.

Effective fall prevention for older people includes targeted strength training using equipment or your own body weight, versatile balance and coordination training partly on unstable ground, and targeted speed-strength training, above all for the legs.

The number of years means little

Due to the huge individual differences in the fitness level of people the same age, it is extremely difficult to give age-specific training tips. There is also no fixed programme for the signs of wear and wear on the joints. In old age, everyone needs to make physical concessions at some point, however, osteoarthritis is highly influenced by genetic factors and can already affect someone aged 50 and others not at all.

What applies to everyone: due to the physical decline, the composition of the sporting activities need to change according to age. Whereas 50 to 60-year-olds can often still fully pursue their athletic ambitions and needs when they feel like it without any complaints, their physical limitations will increase as they get older. Accompanying and preventive measures are therefore increasingly important to ensure the body remains in good shape.

Predominantly pleasurable sports activities thus inevitably turn into increasingly rational ones. The comfort zone becomes more important and the maximum limit more insignificant. It is important to be able to mentally deal with this ageing process. For athletes in particular, getting older means that you have to accept a change in your expectations and athletic ambitions. Preventive forms of training, such as strength exercises, stretching, coordination training, etc. are increasingly important and should be part of your everyday programme.

The effort, however, is definitely worthwhile. Strong muscles protect the joints and provide stability. Sports increases bone density and reduces the risk of fractures caused by falls. Physical activities also have a positive effect on your hormones and make it easier to control your weight, which becomes more difficult in old age if you don’t do sports. And slim people in turn have fewer joint problems. Endurance sports also indirectly reduces numerous risk factors that are responsible for heart attacks. A 70-year-old athlete can be stronger and healthier than a 50-year-old beginning to train. And you can still start doing sports and benefit from it at an advanced age.

Foto:iStock.com