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May 11, 2023

Lifelong Fitness: Navigating Your 40's & Beyond - Taking It Slow

Health

Lifelong Fitness: Navigating Your 40's & Beyond - Taking It Slow

The DVCC Podcast

 

Welcome all to the DVCC Podcast. In this weeks episode we discuss "Taking It Slow" with Stephen Gray, the founder of the DVCC. 

Find out the single best way to guarantee results in the gym and why you probably don't need to train as much as you think you do!

LISTEN HERE

 

 

00:00:00:02 - 00:00:13:19
Hello, everybody. Welcome to the DVCC podcast. Today we're going to be covering “Taking It Slow” with Stephen Gray, the founder of the DVCC. Let's get started. Why do you emphasize taking it slow, especially at the beginning?

00:00:14:07 - 00:00:51:28
What happens after? Well, after 40, feasibly before 40. But you start to notice it certainly as you get past 40, 50, 60. Everyone has some form of injury or consideration or overuse injury, basically something that, if not taken care of, will cause them potentially to have to stop exercising. Now, obviously, when people are trying to start exercising, often having not done anything for a number of years, you know, there'll be plenty of people we see that come into the gym they could be 55.

00:00:52:23 - 00:01:17:21
Obviously, have been very busy raising families, building their careers, etc. over the last, you know, 15, 20 years. And the worst thing that they can do, but also that we can do is try to go too fast, too soon. And so that's where the focus on going slow comes from, because if you do try to go too fast, you will end up injured.

00:01:18:12 - 00:01:41:17
And the thing with injury, it gets harder as you mature to get back to being not injured, if that makes sense. So when you're young and you hurt yourself, you always just assume that you going to go back to normal. Now, that's not the case as you get older because injuries become harder to actually well, rehab or to get rid of completely.

00:01:41:25 - 00:02:10:03
And also, there's a number of other factors involved because confidence plays a massive role, because if you injury your back, for example, exercising well, that's going to massively knock your confidence. Now, one of our biggest focuses is gradually, we call it positive coaching, but trying to build your confidence in yourself, your abilities. And that means really you really only want to be moving forward.

00:02:10:03 - 00:02:44:06
You don't wanna be taking any steps backwards. So, for example, if you come in and you work too hard and you're really sore for two days, for me, that's a step backwards. And the old adage of, Oh, you know, you have to get sore to then make progress is just completely false. That's not the case. You do not have to be super sore to make progress because we are talking about progress for you at the stage of life that you're at and how that looks.

00:02:44:06 - 00:03:08:26
Obviously, we know that getting stronger or at least maintaining strength, depending on how much you've done in the past is one of the most critical components to healthy longevity. And one of the biggest ways you become weaker, if anyone's ever hurt yourselves, injured themselves, you have to injure your leg and have to not use that limb or arm or what have you.

00:03:09:06 - 00:03:36:14
You'll see how quickly your muscle atrophies or breaks down. Essential goes away, essentially gets weaker. And the problem with that is, as we get older, we don't need to give our bodies any help to atrophy. We're actually trying to fight against that atrophy. So anything that really stops us moving or stops us exercising is detrimental to our progress and healthy longevity.

00:03:36:26 - 00:04:03:07
So the biggest like I said, the biggest thing that stops people from exercising is injury, it’s not mindset. It's not motivation. But if you're in pain every time you exercise, I guarantee you're not going to be motivated to exercise. If you get a headache every time you exercise because you're pushing yourself too hard I guarantee you're not motivated or inspired to exercise.

00:04:03:29 - 00:04:28:09
And so from our perspective, we think, is the most critical thing that I always try to maintain is the same is that when we go slow, you need to go slower, because you always want to look forward. There’s plenty of time, fitness is a lifelong pursuit. So there is always time to do that when the time is right, but certainly not at the very beginning.

00:04:28:12 - 00:04:49:04
And for some people, it might never be the case. Like, not everyone needs to be pushing themselves so hard. And I'd actually state that most people don’t. And I think the old adage of how fitness used to be is that you're supposed to push yourself to a level that makes you sore, makes you uncomfortable, and that's not the case.

00:04:49:09 - 00:05:02:00
So you're saying about trying to progress for the stage of life that you're at. And of course, being sore all the time doesn't necessarily mean it’s the only way to make progress. What are some of the areas that you looking to help the person with?

00:05:02:27 - 00:05:32:21
Well, number one is obviously, we know that the strength training is for the macro level fitness quality for everyone. So it's the most important thing to base everything around. Obviously, other things are important, but we only have a limited amount of time, so we base it around the strength training and then add on to that. Now with that, the easy way of kind of setting yourself back is to push too hard within that limit.

00:05:32:22 - 00:06:04:26
So for example, if you do eight repetitions in something, so you lift something for eight times all you do imagine you do eight press ups, for example. Well, if eight press ups is your absolute limit. Well, from our perspective, you’re doing too much. So I'd much rather people are able to do the did they maybe did eight but were able to do 15 or 20 which is a far safer and slower approach to fitness.

00:06:04:27 - 00:06:30:13
A lot of times people will think that they have to lift, you know, or do something to their maximum to get the benefit, which even when I think back now to younger days or athletes, for example, for an athlete and you do a form of, I don't know, weight training that impacts your sports specific training, well, that's not right because that will negatively impact your progress.

00:06:31:07 - 00:06:51:09
And that is very similar, actually, if you think about it to anything in the gym. Shouldn’t really when we're talking about once you've passed 40 and what you're training for, shouldn't then impact what you're doing in your day to day life. You shouldn't be struggling to get out of bed or struggling to get off of the sofa because you're you push yourself too far.

00:06:51:17 - 00:07:15:06
That's not the whole point, as suppost to add to your life. And it can and you can still get that progress. You can still get the benefits, but you just have to go slower and build slowly because like I said, you're going to be doing this, you know, feasibly as long as you're fit and healthy, which obviously is what you're trying to achieve.

00:07:15:17 - 00:07:19:12
So you don't need to try and get it all done too quickly.

00:07:20:12 - 00:07:49:13
And maybe just one final point to pull out there that you mentioned about, of course, taking it slow and you gave the example there of, you know, perhaps not pushing yourself all the way to failure for something like a press up. But also the obvious question seems to be how many sessions you might look to do. Obviously, it's going to be an individual basis, but what would be a good number for someone to aim for at the beginning of their fitness journey, perhaps when they were coming and over 40?

00:07:49:23 - 00:08:16:17
Yeah, well, that's the thing. It really depends on what you've been doing. If you've not been doing any form of exercise, your 55, 60, even a bad hip, bad knee, you've got, you know, issues with your neck. Well one session a week to begin with to then lead into two could be the perfect number for you. But it’s the consistency of being able to do those one or two sessions you see?

00:08:16:25 - 00:08:47:17
So the consistency over the year, for example, is going to be the impact as opposed to you could be trying to do 3 to 4, but you only managed to do it for a short period of time and then you get injured and everyone has a tolerance level and. And what you find is that the recovery time, the time that you're able to essentially repair yourself, I suppose if you look at it basically and so we can talk about it here becomes more challenging.

00:08:47:17 - 00:09:16:25
Obviously, the rest of your life has a massive impact on that. But I would say, again, if we're talking about going slow, that's why I would say start with 1 to 2 and then you can always, if you really want and you don't have to build upon that, but you're much better to start with. One feel like you can do more and then do more as opposed to starting with three and then having to dial it back because for whatever reason your sore or your hurt or you just can't you can't handle it.

00:09:19:05 - 00:09:22:16
Okay, So consistency is the key, long term consistency.

00:09:23:13 - 00:09:23:27
Correct.

00:09:23:27 - 00:09:34:08
In anything! That was a nice short snippet and a good window into definitely how our approach is at that DVCC. Any final words, you want to sign off on there Stephen?

00:09:34:13 - 00:09:38:07
When you think you go slow, go slower, and then you'll be safe.

00:09:39:09 - 00:09:41:00
Perfect. All right. Thank you very much.

00:09:42:13 - 00:09:43:06
Cheerio. Thanks.

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