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Weight loss is one of the common goals for almost everyone in Spain, but there are still some false beliefs around this goal: that after 50 or 60 years it is harder to lose weightand that it is not worth any exercise to accomplish it. Some go so far as to say that men and women should do different workouts.
But as a recent study published in the journal Medicines for athletes, the reality is quite different from the popular belief. And it is that, according to this new work, resistance training it would benefit both men and women over the age of 50.
One of the key points that would motivate some false beliefs would be muscle gain when you do resistance training or strength training. Men’sthey usually have a absolutely higher muscle gain; However, Ladies have some very similar relative gains.
Basic endurance exercises.
In other words, while the muscle size of men would be larger, if the basic size of men and women is taken into account, the relative gains would be similar. TO percentage level, so much Men’s as Ladies win the same level of muscle mass when I do strength training. And these gains would continue after 50 years.
To reach these conclusions, researchers from University of New South Wales analyzed results of 30 studies resistance training attended by over 1400 volunteers. This paper specifically assessed the results of men and women over the age of 50.
As Dr. Amanda Hagstrom, professor of exercise science at UNSW Medicine & Health and lead author of the paper, remembers, in the past it was believed that men were better suited for strength training.
However, Dr. Hagstrom recalls that the data were misfocused: absolute gains were taken into account and not relative gains. And men’s body size is usually larger, so their total gains tend to be higher in the end. But if you take into account the profit percentage, things change.
Previous research, where data from young adults (between 18 and 50 years old) have been analyzed, has already suggested that relative muscle gains are similar in both men and women. But it would be the first meta-analysis to examine these data in older adults.
Get better after 50 years
In total, increase in muscle mass and strength for 651 men and 759 women aged 50 to 90 years who participated in the 30 studies mentioned above. Most participants had no previous strength training experience.
It should be noted that, although 50-year-olds are not usually considered “older adults”, this threshold was selected taking into account the potential hormonal changes of menopause and their influence on the outcome of resistance training.
Thus, it was concluded that there are no significant differences in relative changes in muscle size or strength gains between men or women after 50 years. In fact, they point out, knowing this data would be important for professionals dedicated to training people of this age, since then. there would be no basis to differentiate them by sex.
According to this study, older men tended to develop bigger muscles if you take into account the absolute gains. In addition, they were also prone to greater absolute strength improvements compared to women.
However, if relative increases in strength (taking into account body size) were taken into account, older women obtained better results in the relative strength of the body compared to men.
In addition, the researchers also conducted a literature review to see which strength training techniques would be best for each gender:
– old man It seems to benefit more from higher intensity training programs to improve absolute strength at both the top and bottom.
– elderly woman It seems to benefit more from higher overall exercise volumes, which means that more weekly repetitions would help women increase their relative and absolute strength in the lower body.
The same, a the longer duration of the workout would also help to increase the absolute and relative muscle size for older men or the absolute strength of the upper body for older women.
In the end, it would turn out that endurance training also offers other health benefits, such as increasing strength, balance, flexibility and bone density; in addition to improving sleep, well-being and the ability to reduce the risk of injury.