Is 50 The New 20?

pic: tom evans, el cap reports

Another for the “age doesn’t mean shit” files, my friend Hans has once again set the speed record on The Nose of El Capitan. At 48, the full-time father with a full-time job has somehow found time to get faster than he’s ever been and smashed the record by more than 13 minutes. He’s first set the record in 1990 and each time it’s been broken he’s gotten it back--more than 20x over the years. After failing to recapture it last fall he trained through the winter and nailed it on the first attempt. Huge congrats to Hans Florine and his partner Alex Honnold (who capped what’s probably the most impressive single month in the history of Yosemite) for your Friday Psyche.

There’s a great photo account of the ascent on Tom Evans’ El Cap Reports site. Click below for the play by play:

I got up real early, as the day was predicted to be a hot one, and motored down to ElCap at about 5:30am. Fortunately for the climbers and unfortunately for me, they planned to climb completely in the shade for the entire route. That made photography difficult but I figured I could take a stab at it and maybe get lucky with some good shots.

The place was already filling up with spectators hoping to be on hand to watch a new record set on the Nose. They were not to be disappointed! Alex and Hans started at 5:52am as noted by the cheers of a couple dozen of the people who had walked to the base with them.

I’ve reported on Hans’ exploits on the Nose for years. If you’re interested in the history of the climb I recapped it here:

History of Speed Climbing The Nose

More and more we’re seeing athletes age without losing their top-end speed, or even getting faster. And while there are some facts on growing old that we can’t ignore it’s certainly clear that the limitations once imposed by professionals are being pushed further and further back.

“Age Doesn’t Mean Shit”...

...is a somewhat famous quote by track legend Johnny Gray after he won some race (Pam Am Games I recall—maybe age affecting my memory) in his 40s. And while father time will catch up to all of us eventually it’s been my mantra both before and after he’d said it. In fact, I’d say it’s an unspoken mantra for Beachbody since our goal as trainers is to offset aging through diet and exercise, which is more effective than even anti-aging medicine if you want to live an active life for as long as you’re here.

With that I present today’s Psyche vid of 52 year old college professor Bill Ramsey climbing an 8c (5.14b). This is a grade climbed by only a fraction of climbing’s elite. And while it sounds like he gave to route over 400 attempts most people still wouldn’t be able to do this if they were paid to climb full time. It’s an incredible athletic achievement, especially for old dude, and even more so considering how powerful the climb is since we lose fast twitch muscle fiber as we age.

Ramsey’s training is legendary. According to Mike Doyle’s blog:

At some point I will try to get footage of one of his training days. 6am wakeup, stumble to the coffee maker, go into his garage for some deadhangs to warmup, do a little training there, then off to the climbing gym for 3-4 hours then to the treadwall for another 2-3 hours before hitting weights to finish it off. I can’t even fathom it but clearly it works for him.

Who says you have to reduce training volume with age? I am inspired, though I’ll still never attempt one route 400 times because, well, I’d probably lose my mind, my wife, and most of my friends. That said I still find this exceptionally cool.

Study: Exercise Prevents Premature Aging

You’ll have to excuse me for re-using a graphic from a post a few weeks back. It’s even more appropriate for today’s entry on the effects of exercise on aging.

The actual title refers to endurance exercise but the findings here were mainly obvious so it didn’t seem worth dilluting the topic. Mark Tarnopolsky, professor of pediatrics and medicine of the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine and principal investigator of a study on the relationship between exercise and aging at McMasters University stated, "We have clearly shown that there is no substitute for the "real thing" of exercise when it comes to protection from aging."

While I’m pretty sure that anyone following my blog knows this, I reported on the study for a couple of reasons. First, I’m sick of people trying to champion nutrition as the be all end all of of health. Humans are animal that are designed to move. When we don’t we fall apart prematurely. End of story.

Diet is important, sure, especially the way we’re taught to eat these days. But exercise is the big ticket to health. Bad diet can be offset by exercise a lot more effectively than what a good diet can do for you if you sit on the couch all day. This study is getting’ some Straight Dope love because it forcefully points this out.

"Others have tried to treat these animals with 'exercise pill' drugs and have even tried to reduce their caloric intake, a strategy felt to be the most effective for slowing aging, and these were met with limited success," said Tarnopolsky.

The other reason it picqued my interest was this,

These mice were genetically engineered to age faster due to a defect in a gene for polymerase gamma (POLG1) that alters the repair system of their mitochondria — the cellular powerhouses responsible for generating energy for nearly every cell in the body.

Mitochondria are unique in that they have their own DNA. It has been thought that lifelong accumulation of mitochondrial DNA mutations lead to energy crisis that result in a progressive decline in tissue and organ function, ultimately resulting in aging. But the study on genetically-disadvantaged mice found those who had endurance exercise training three times a week looked as young as healthy mice while their sedentary siblings were balding, graying, physically inactive, socially isolated and less fertile.

Not the part about genetically engineering mice to age quickly. I find that ethically a little troubling. But the part about mitochodria having their own DNA is down right fascinating, and a pretty clear link to the importance of exercise. I do take note that unsupervised treadmill running is not necessarily “endurance” exercise, which should only be stated if they controlled that situation, which there is no indication of. The mice could have been interval training and my guess is they probably were but, you know, whatever.

"I believe that we have very compelling evidence that clearly show that endurance exercise is a lifestyle approach that improves whole body mitochondrial function which is critical for reducing morbidity and mortality,” states lead author Adeel Safdar. “Exercise truly is the fountain of youth."

Power & Aging

Power is the strength athlete’s Holy Grail. Power (absolute strength) training is our crack. It’s addicting, and I’ve know many athletes over the years who eschew everything, even their sport’s performance, in pursuit of numbers that indicate absolute strength. 100% efficiency is the goal. At 101% you’re injured. It’s the one thing in sport that truly is extreme. It’s dangerous. It’s fun. And it’s vital if you want to achieve your body’s potential.

Yesterday I had one of the best training sessions I’ve had in years. I did all the moves on my project simulation with a 10lb weight vest. I increased my performance on every set of my hangboard workout. I did a few moves on the campus board that I’ve been too scared to even attempt this decade. When it was over I felt as though I was just warming up. I iced my fingers as a precaution. I’ve been down this road many times and had an idea of what was in store.

This morning my heart rate was high, the first indicator of breakdown. My morning yoga practice was then very difficult. I’m much stiffer than normal; a reaction to the microtrauma incurred from trying to recruit high threshold muscle cell motor units. Over the coming weeks I’m going to have to be very careful. I’ve not completed a power training phase without injury or overtraining in at least a decade.

Aging sharpens the edge the strength athlete teeters on. Our fast-twitch muscle fiber decreases, as does the amount of various hormones that allow us to access it. The fast-twitch muscle we have recovers even slower than it did when we were young. And those inevitable 101% attempts set us back even further. It’s no surprise that there are hoards of aging endurance athletes. There are very few power athletes.

I try and explore the boundaries of both power and endurance. My challenges appear endurance oriented on the surface, mainly because anything that may be remotely impressive to an onlooker is their volume. But the thing of interest, for me, is the limit of human performance and this includes absolute strength. For this reason there is always a power element involved. Boulder problems, onsighting climbs, reacting to single track during the night, etc, all require engaging fast-twitch muscle fibers.

We don’t make power workouts for Beachbody. We have power elements within our workouts. Both P90X and Insanity have a lot of plyometric work, which is the essence of power training. But it’s tempered so that you can do a lot of reps. Absolute strength training is about maximal recruitment and, ultimately, the one rep max. But this like training under the Sword of Damocles. At some point it’s going to fall. To train for health and fitness it isn’t necessary. Only athletes play beneath it.

The quandary is that power training is healthy. High recruitment leads to hormonal release which is effectively anti-aging. The closer to 100% you can safely train the more effective your workout program will be. And that’s why I’m here, playing the lab rat so that you don’t have to. My goal is to find what that safe range is, and then how to increase it. This time, damnit, I’m going to get it right!

pic: photos of yore: phil campusing at the castle.

Feeling Old?

Check out this 74-year old. Apparently there are over 40,000 people in Japan that are over 100 years old, and I'm sure this has much more to do with lifestyle than genetics (do we even have an over 75 bodybuilding category, because this guy is nervous about moving up because the competition is so stiff?!). Culturally they eat a plant-based diet and a lot of fish. Plus, their snacks are so weird that it must self limit overindulgence. Regardless, this guy is an inspiration and a perfect fit for Jack LaLanne week.

Another perfect fit, as to just why Jack week is so important, is the ad before the vid, brought to us by Jimmy Dean sausage. Yahoo also released this and one-upped the Brits with an ad from Dunkin Donuts. How dare another country try and usurp our obesity title!

Age

"Age doesn't mean shit."
- Johnny Gray, after winning the Pan Am games 800m nearing his forth decade

After interviewing Tony for his 50th you'd probably think that he and I both share this same sentiment. And, well, yes, we do--in some sense. It’s also silly to say that we don't acknowledge it. Unfortunately, age does mean shit. Aging and slowing down are inevitable. Fortunately for us, exercise--especially hard exercise--is the most effective way to combat it.

In the interview, Tony nails it pretty well when he says he's in the best shape of his life but concedes that "I'm a little slower." There is nothing you can do about your peak athletic fitness declining as you age. But by learning about your body and training it more efficiently you can continue to improve on your overall physical condition.

As we age our bodies produce fewer hormones. In the simplest sense, this is how we die. Nothing forces hormone produce more than exercise. Even doping (as in anti-aging medicine) can't compete. Nutrition also helps, but exercise tops all. This is because it forces our body into a stressful "survival" tendency where we produce more hormones to offset the shock of the exercise. And this keeps us from aging as rapidly.

This is why many "experts" are 100% wrong when they tell us to slow down as we age. Most elderly workouts stress gentile aerobic work and eschew "dangerous" resistance work. This is generally because they are afraid of advising people to do things were they may hurt themselves. But no sports injury is as bad for you as aging quickly, making this philosophy seem counterintuitive. Resistance work is exactly what we need. The more intensity you can handle the better off you will be. High intensity training forces hormones to release the keep you young--things like testosterone and HGH, the exact stuff that anti-aging doctors will shoot you full of if you pay them are available to you, for free, if you'll do a little work.

Of course age needs to be considered. As we age we don't recover as fast, even with the extra hormone boosts, because we'll never match the amount we produced when we were younger. Our ratio of muscle mass declines each year along with our ability to recover. So overtraining becomes more and more a possibility as we age, making intelligent training cycles more important, as well as become more tuned into "listening" to your body. But if we truly get wiser as we age we can use this knowledge to train more efficiently so that, like Tony says, head into our AARP years feeling like it's the beginning of the beginning, instead of the beginning of the end.

pic: "I can't die. It would ruin my image." – Jack

Fab 50

Tony just turned 50. Happy birthday, man. Here's part I of a little birthday tribute, which Tony called his 'best birthday present'. We'll have an interview coming just as soon as we can connect our schedules.

What is old, anyway? When it comes to birthdays, we're all just out there chasing Jack LaLanne.