Muscles and Aging

As we age, the rate that muscles break down tends to exceed the rate of protein synthesis that is needed to produce new muscle fibers. Even exercise in older individuals does not stimulate new muscle protein synthesis as well as it does in a younger person.

Finding strategies to boost the efficiency of new muscle fiber formation can have a large impact on quality of health as well as mobility in an aging population. Quality protein provides more than an array of amino acids within the food. Other factors are involved and have an influence on how those amino acids are actually used.

Need for Exercise

Exercise is also important to the utilization of protein. Your body will not build muscle unless you use your muscles. This is because muscles require energy; they are metabolically expensive to maintain. As you age your body conserves energy as best it can. In this context muscles that are not in use will be broken down to help conserve energy.

Demanding physical activity implies you use your muscles, which in turn encourages your body to keep them. Resistance training (weight lifting) is one way to stimulate muscles to build new fibers out of protein.

Type 1 and Type 2 Muscle Fibers

Muscles are made up of two different types of individual muscle fibers: type one and type two.

• Type one muscle fibers, also known as slow-twitch muscle fibers, are aerobic. They’re resistant to fatigue and focused on smaller movements that can be sustained for long periods.
• Type two muscle fibers, also known as fast-twitch muscle fibers, get tired more easily but allow for more powerful movements. Type two muscle fibers contain more blood supply than type one fibers.

Endurance and aerobic exercise builds more type one muscle fibers, while strength training builds more type two muscle fibers. That means you’ll likely see results with muscle growth faster with strength training than with other types of exercise.

My Story

I love the way we used to play when we were kids. We played rain or shine, with not much equipment and with anybody. As I grew up, things got more organized, playing cricket, volleyball or badminton with players of similar calibre. Soon, with work/family/kids/business, that too took a back seat. Soon, I started feeling lethargic and could sense a drop in energy level.

So, in my mid-forties, I took to running. It needed very little equipment, very portable in time or location, reconnected me with Nature and had a good mix of solitude as well as group activity.

Most importantly, it satisfied the requirement of exercise in my weekly regimen.