Conditioning for when you are in your 30s and 40s

So my wife and I moved to a new town about a year ago and with a new baby, it has been difficult getting our groove in and get our training time strait.

Recently, we decided to make the commitment to set a good example for the kid and get our conditioning back where it needs to be, but I want to make sure we are focusing on the right stuff. I am just turning 39 (I cannot believe I just said that) and my wife is in her early 30s. Weight loss and cardio are definitely part of the picture. Our system had both ground fighting and stand up kickboxing and we want to make sure we can handle 5, 2-4 minute rounds back-to-back in each. In the past, there has been cretin things I have done for my cardio runs that did help in this, but I noticed that as I got older, my recovery from those practices took longer and I guess given that we are not a young as we used to be, I want to get the best bang for my buck.

For the 30 and older crowd, Is there anything you found to work really well to make sure you kept your competitive edge up? And when did you decide that it was time to hang the gloves if you did?

 

yes well I have done such at bit older than you, and your age is a factor but not perhaps as much as you think it maybe.

the key is little and often, not throwing yourself in and then being out of action for a week or three.

you heal/ recover more slowly as your blood chemistry won't support fast healing,. However by gently hurting yourself repeatedly you will change its make up and the recovery process will improve dramaticaly and then you can build up the amount of effort in the knowledge that you can do it again the next day or at least the one after that.
do not repeat not get carried away and injure yourself .it only slows the whole process down.
exercises is not a good way of losing weight or rather it is when you have a really good level of fitness ,if you want to lose weight in the short term diet

if you look at human activities, then they require in different amounts, strengh,endurance, aerobic, balance, co ordination reactions and flexability. So any fitness program need to have a way of improving them all .

throwing a heavy dog ball against a wall and catching it repeatedly, can do quite a few of those. Standing on one leg can be done in the super market queue if you don't mind looking odd. Go play football with you kids, get a dog that wants five mile walks or bike to work. Press ups pull ups, sit up and squats are always good. So you can work them into your daily life with out going near a gym.
by Slowly building up your fitness base, then in say 6months you will be in a very different state than you are now

 

I just do the same things that I did when I was younger. The only difference is that I have to be mindful that it takes a little longer for me to recover. I try to remember this so I don't over do the exercises. I also try to aid my recovery by eating stuff that helps my recover. This will probably vary from person to person. When I have a hard week of working out, I will either eat a banana once a day for 3 days or drink orange juice twice a day for 3 days. This will usually help my body to recover from the worn out muscle feel as if my body is "running on empty." I also will lower the intensity of my workout on the following days or I will skip a day of working out. This usually helps me to bounce back without having to take some special nutrition mixture. In general I try to eat healthy; some days are better than others.

 

Jump rope.

 

As we age, the recovery takes longer. Being 41, I'm still capable of doing most things I did in my 20s. The difference now is I can't do them continually.

A big part of recovery is sleep. The more active we are, the more we need. Put a new baby into the mix, and it's a recipe for disaster. You're probably most tired and worn down from the lack of sleep.

Train smarter. Technology and our understanding of exercise physiology has come a long way in the last several years. The best and most efficient way to see exercise gains is interval training IMO. Alternating short bursts of near maximal heart rate with longer durations of lower heart rate. For example, getting your heart rate up to near maximum for 20 seconds, then doing low intensity stuff for 90 seconds, then repeating for 20 minutes or so. Use a heart rate monitor such as a Polar chest strap or a Fitbit.

The times are argued by exercise physiologists, but the principle isn't. You can mix up different types of exercise, such as alternating sprinting and jogging, hitting a heavy bag hard and fast then doing slower and lighter punches/kicks, etc.

The times you do and how much you rest between workouts will vary according to your fitness level. You may be able to go to harder for longer, need two days in between sessions, etc. It'll be trial and error until you get it right. The single most important thing is paying attention to your heart rate and times, and not if you think you're going hard or easy enough.

Just something to consider.

 

i think diet is important but not in the old way of "going on a diet" but rather the type and quantities of the food you eat. nothing new in this ....eat more veggies and less sugar. your ability to sustain a work out regimen will increase with good foods.

 

it depend what you are calling good and bad food, a good diet providers you with the over all calories need, a bad diet gives to many or not enough. Those calories need to consist of protein, fat and carbs and sugars. In addition you need vitamins and minerals that come from fruit and veg. Though apparently if you eat sufficient organ meat, you can get by with out so many vegs.

eating more veg isn't good, if its at the expense of other dietry requirements, and once you have met your vitamin requirements, there are no additional benefits from eating more of them

 

I'm not aware of any reports that say hiit is the bests' way of gaining fitness, I've,seen a few that says it has equal health benefits as longer Casio. But if what you need is longer,duration cardio, then doing twenty seconds burst is next to useless.
that said it seems to be constantly misapplied, the idea is to o a short burst for say one minute of near max heart rate, then rest for half that time say 30secs then repeat. If yo do as you suggested, it takes near 20secs to get your heart rate up and then you stop and rest for a minute and a half. That's going to have practically no,effect on ether heart health or oxygen tranfere. Though it will make you quite good at sprinting for 20secs, which may come in useful if you have to run for a bus

 

Am 62, still train 5 days a week.
Don't do much running due to having had 2 total knee replacements.
I do 10 3 minute training rounds with 30 second active breaks between rounds after my warmup and strength rounds. 3 minutes skipping for warm up, 2 kettlebell or barbell strength rounds, 5 heavy bag striking rounds, 4 ground dummy striking rounds, 1 round of core exercises.

4 hour break then on Mon & Wed 1 hr Wing Chun & 1 hr Kali. On Tue & Thur 1 hr Muay Thai & 1 hr BJJ or Submission Wrestling. Sat. 10 Rds, Muay Thai, Wing Chun, & finally Kali.

 

not bad at all, I'm 58 I do five days of training, five mile walk , usually an hour of stretching and static holds, then a hundred or so press ups, 30 pulls ups a load of box jumps, some dips 100 body weight squats . Then some weighted squats, knee raises hanging off the bar, then some front lever then a mile run, then five miles walk home. On my rest days I do karate and play five aside soccer. I'm trying to ramp it up a bit by doing burpees and running up flights of steps

 

Martial Arts After 40

 

I've forgot who has me on ignore now, but why should doing ma after 40 be different enough to warrant a book. Learning new motor patterns and gaining fitness can take longer, but other than that there is no difference

 

Have you read any exercise physiology professional journals?

As for the long sustained cardio, it's one of the most misinterpreted studies in exercise physiology history. That "fat burning zone" training is highly flawed.

And the 20 sec high intensity/90 sec low intensity is a starting point. And you don't start timing the 20 sec UNTIL you hit that max heart rate; get there, stay there for 20 sec, then during the 90 sec try to get back to the "fat burning zone," lather, rinse, repeat. If someone has never done interval training before, and all they've done is long and sustained cardio, and they're approaching 40, the numbers I said are a good starting point. I also said the times and recovery period will be a trial and error thing. Once it's easy, adjust the times and/or recovery period.

Interval training has been scientifically shown to burn more fat and increase VO2 max better than any other method by virtually every current scientific study.

Exercise physiologists will argue times ad neauseum. What they won't argue is interval training's effectiveness pretty much across the board. Why do you think HIIT is so popular nowadays?

As counterintuitive as it seems, it even benefited marathon runners in a study or two. I wouldn't have believed that if I didn't read it in a peer reviewed scientific journal.

 

well it's just this weeks craze, and it suits lazy people so bound to be popular, so which of these journals support your claim that its better than fast running for improving vo2 max. It's better than jogging, but then washing up so better than a slow jog.
I'm sceptical that a high heart rate for twenty seconds is better for you than a high heart rate for 10 mins, perhaps you can post some evidence?

I can run a mile and a half in ten mins, so really what we need you to show is that someone can go from 20sec burst and then have the aerobic capacity to jump straight to that sort of feat then I can admit those all those mile and a half o did to build up that aerobic capacity were waste of time

 

Swim sprints.

 

If you can run at max heart rate for 30 minutes straight, then interval training is not going to help you. Show me someone who can run at max heart rate for that long, and I'll say he/she is the best runner of all time.

You're getting hung up on the 20 seconds thing. It was a STARTING POINT, as I clearly said. How about running at max heart rate for 60 sec, and at fat burn rate for 2 minutes, alternating for 30 minutes? Would that make you reconsider? Will that get the 20 sec hang up you have out of your head? Where did I say running at a high rate for 20 sec is better than at a high rate for 10 minutes? Interval training is better than running at a high rate for 10 minutes because you can go longer and spend more OVERALL time in a max heart rate zone if you're alternating high and low heart rates. Again, exercise physiology expert, I said 20 sec was a STARTING POINT. ADJUST THE TIME SO IT FITS YOU. How else can I make that clear.

There's so many studies done on interval training it's not even funny.

Here's a few professional journal links. Search interval training all you want...

American Society of Exercise Physiologists :: Journal of Professional Exercise Physiology

Exercise Physiology

ACSM | ACSM Journals

Here's a general information article written by the American College of Sports Medicine. They're a quite credible source...

The Basics of High-Intensity Interval Training

And I'm done. I almost forgot that you know everything and no one can tell you otherwise. Reading something and memorizing it isn't true intelligence. Actually understanding it and being able to apply it is.

 

Yes, sleep deprivation has not helped. I also work 3rd shift, so there are days when I only get 4-6 hours of sleep, if I am lucky.

 

Not a bad idea, we would just need ongoing access to a swimming area. I know my wife loves to get in the water when she can. Is there any direct information on how swim sprints correlate with tournament endurance?

 

Nope.
Its hard. You get out of breath. Fighting is hard and you get out of breath

So swim sprints should make you better without blowing your knees