Exercise keeps you healthy. If you are in poor health, exercise can improve your health and increase the odds that you can become healthy. Exercise boosts your immune system, keeps the mind sharp, improves sleep, maintains muscle tone, and extends a healthy lifespan. Extending a healthy lifespan should be the ultimate goal of an exercise program. Living healthier longer is really the gold standard of an exercise program especially for people over 50.
A study published in Cell Metabolism found that exercise and in particular HIIT (high intensity interval training) caused cells to make more proteins for their energy producing mitochondria and their protein building ribosomes, effectively stopping aging at the cellular level. There are no medicines out there that will do this. Exercise is the only thing and specifically HIIT in delaying the aging process. The study compared three groups, one that did high intensity biking, one which focused solely on strength training with weights and one group that did both high intensity training and weight training. The study found that in the interval training group the younger participants saw a 49% increase in mitochondrial capacity, and the older participants (65-80), saw a much larger increase of 69%. Interval training also improved insulin sensitivity which indicates a lower likelihood of developing diabetes. The interval training was less effective at improving muscle strength, which declines with age.
So if you were to do only one form of exercise high intensity interval training would be the best choice especially for those over 50. This would be a good form of exercise but to reap the best outcome and see the best results, combine the HIIT and the strength training. Building lean muscle would help to ensure that you could better offset the hazards of aging. So a 3-4 days a week coupled with 2 days of strength training would be the right prescription for health and aging well. I can help you get started [email protected]