The Health HubThe older we get, the more important it is to maintain health, but what movements are the true needle-movers for a longer, healthier life?
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You're listening to the Weekend Collective podcast from news talk s.
Y's welcome back. This is the Weekend Collective. A little bit of the rolling stance to get us going there. I think we're gonna have to have a bit of satisfaction later on. I think we're gonna have to get sick with the theme on the old rock front and we'll welcome back anyway. By the way, if you missed our discussion on Politics Central, quite a lot of feedback from people on the on the Boy Razor crackdown as well. I think it's gonna be a popular move for the government, and good on them because I don't know how many people I've got too much sympathy with people who put the public's lives in danger. You can check it out on a podcast. Go to iheartradioor newstalk s, head Beat or Carried in Z and look for the Weekend Collective. We get our each hour. We get loaded pretty quickly after we've done the show, so you can be confident and if you've just missed the hour and going back and checking the podcast. But right now it is time for the Health Hub and before we introduce our guest, the theme that we're looking at are a couple of themes to one, whether you can actually exercise and eat and have an exercise and a lifestyle regime where you can maybe try and give yourself a chance of mimicking those people who may know, the people who live in the green and what is it not the green zone the blue zones around the world. You know, the Mediterranean diet and you see these people they live to over one hundred And I mean, is it just genetics or is it just eating copious amounts of olives? Because all I think is the Mediterranean diet if you don't like olives. But anyway, that's a very simplistic and ignorant take from me. But also the question around as you get older, you may be sitting there thinking, you know what, I've had this sort of sedentary lifestyle, but I've left it too late. Is there such a thing as leaving it too late to actually get yourself in order? And this is all to do with longevity as well. I'm living longer, But have you got to a point where you think, oh, look, it's just too late to turn things back physically or are you one of those people who's actually made a fitness come back. You know you thought, oh my goodness, I've left it till I don't know, my fifties, sixties, seventies, I don't know. And I have seen people have turned their lives around, I think even in their seventies. So have you done it? And if you've got any questions, because I think that's one of the big questions for people around fitness is off and we feel, oh, I've let myself slip, I've left it too late. Well, we've got the perfect guest in the studio. Of course, he does deal with sometimes some more mature exercises, but he's also helped people turn their lives around who may have had days of glory. I mean we all had days of glory, didn't we. When you're in your teens, you know you've played for this team or that team I played for the third fifteen or and you look back and I'm never going to get in that shape again. But he is involved in turning people around, and he is the founder and coach at Body Talk. And his name is almost need a drum roll after that introduction as Alex Fluint Gaday, Alex A game.
Good a ten. Thank you for that kind introduction.
But that is your business. It's I mean, I guess if you're involved in fitness, we are by definition just about everyone's trying to turn something around, aren't they.
They are. It's a very positive industry to work in. Basically, everyone that walks through the door that I see at my gym is there for self improvement, which is a great thing to be a part of. But yep, everyone's looking to turn something around, whether it's their on field performance, their half marathon time, maybe it's their cholesterols too high, or they their knees don't work quite like they used to. And they're all really good things that we can chase through healthy lifestyles.
Speaking of turning things around, I'm not sure that's quite the right segue for me to say it. But when we met, I mean, you're a you are a very fit looking man, but you look like you've you look like you've lost a few kilos or something. I did notice that. Not that I'm tracking your fitness, you tracked mine. And you know, stick me on that. What's that thing I swiveled around on It measus all your body fat and stuff.
Three D scanner.
Yeah, that's fun, isn't it? Anyway? What are you up to? You look like you have you dropped the weights or something, or you're toning down.
Yeah. Well, up until twenty twenty two, I competed in powerlifting in master's powerlifting.
Love it.
I love strength sports and weightlifting in general, and I was competing internationally up until then. But unfortunately my body just started to fail me with that really sort of extreme approach, which, like any sport, you know, there's there's healthy, and there's optimum, and then there's the extreme that you need to be at for your sport. So unfortunately I had to sort of give it away.
Does that mean that there's is that maybe a twinge here and a twinge there, and you think, oh, you know what, I might have to just tone it down.
About Yeah, especially my poor old hip is not what it used to be. And that's largely just I mean, when you compete in any sport, you're trying to get the absolute most out of your body. Actually I just can't do that really really super heavy lifting, so I've stopped doing that. I still weight train three times a week, but now I've decided I want to run a marathon, so hence all my weight is dropping off.
But a lot of that.
Actually, scarily, there is a reasonablemount of muscle mass that's come off for me as well. But yeah, I'm about ten kilos lighter than Wow.
Are you changing the way you're ex I mean, obviously getting rid of from marathon is one thing. Are you changing the way you do weights as well for the marathon?
Yeah?
Yeah, So my weight training has become a lot more. I'd say it's like a supporting role now. So I view it as something which is keeping my body together so that I can stay on the on the road. So I do a lot more kind of prehab and rehabilitation, soul work and functional strengths just to make sure that all the things that running can kind of I guess bang up a little bit in your hamstrings, you lower back, your glutes, you're upper back miles. Yeah, I do a lot of strength working that. But still there is still probably some stuff that we'll talk about later today, some key lifts that you want to keep in your your regime, regardless of whatelse what else.
I'm just making a note of that right now. Actually it's funny, but so how long are you giving yourself to train for the marathon?
Specifically about sixteen weeks. But I've been at it a bit longer than that. I'd run a half marathon. At the end of last year I did the Queenstown half Marathon and then I did the the Auckland Waterfront one. So I've been at it for a while, but I'm sixteen weeks. Honestly, it's a It's the total opposite end of the spectrum to strength sports. And I still I've run twenty four k today and I still think, how am I ever going to get that's some forty two kilometers. I've not built a low way.
Actually, funny thing is I when I arrived at work, I often go and to have a chat at the news desk just say you know what's going on? One of the what's you know? What are the exciting stories of the day, and our news director Danakha I said, I find it. Didn't see you last weekend, And all I do is I just I don't think I've ever seen down standing up because she's always at the news desk working hard, and she said, I was are way down. I did the rot Room marathon last week Wow, and it's it's you know, But she seems to the way she described it. I wouldn't say she found it effortless. She talked about how heart it was, but she did sort of discovery did the marathon. That's incredible. Even trumpet it, it's just like, you know whatever, just drop that in there.
I have quite a few marathon runners, a lot of women that come to my gym that run marathon, and I've gained a whole new level of respect for just what it takes. You know, and it's not only the actual event, it's the training and you know, the dedication. So everyone out there that's run a marathon have huge respect for you.
I think the training would be the harder part, because at least with the marath this is just I've never done one, so what do I know? But I have I think the tough days when you don't feel like doing that run, and the conditions you'd have to go out and pushing yourself. If your training on your own, as opposed to when you're in a marathon, there must be some level of emotional impetus that you get from the fact that you are one of I don't know hundreds or thouds of people doing it.
Yeah, you definitely get swept up in the crowds is a huge part of it.
Yeah.
I think the other thing is just a discipline. You know, like every Saturday or Sunday on shaping up to do this really long run. And you know that means that there's a lot of stuff that you have to put on hold.
So have you done twenty sand morning, twenty four this morning?
Oh?
Good, good good, I'm glad, you're glad you made it.
In Yeah, why don't you just run and slower?
Except hey, now, is it is it ever too late to sort yourself out? You think you've you've left it too long? I mean how late? It is too late?
The best to saying I've ever heard is the best time to start, Well, it's actually come from planting a tree. The best time to plant a tree was yesterday and the second best time is today. And that's exactly the same when it comes to exercise. So while the best benefits are going to come through a build up over time, regardless of that what the style of exercise you're doing, it really is never too late. And when I was at university, I can still remember doing looking at some studies that were using some women in nursing homes that could no longer stand up, and after six short weeks of doing physical therapy and exercise, our back standing up. So if you extrapolate that out, that means that they're now more likely to be able to walk there, obviously more able to use their muscles, and from that stems a flow of maybe gaining back some independence. So that's someone you know that's in the very late stages of their life. We specialize at my gym in forties, fifties, and sixty year olds and that it is incredible the shape that people get in and we have. I can think of one lady actually who had never ever lifted a weight in her life until she was in her sixties. When she first came into our gym. It's been a slow burn for her. Her expectations probably had to be tempered a bit because I think she thought things were going to turn around.
Very next week.
So I'm rocking, yeah, Yeah, And she's incredible now.
Yeah.
My head coach and my gym Phil and I just marvel about it every day, like what she's like. Literally, I think it's like that sliding door analogy. Where would she be if she just kept on down that road and now turning it around so whether it's muscle mass, so it's cardiovascular fitness, your flexibility. Most of the research shows that well into our seventies we can still get very good improvement at some stage. Obviously, you know, once we've passed our thirties and into our forties and fifties, potentially we start to look at more kind of hold on trying to hold on to what we've got. But that really depends on where you're at at that time. So if we're talking about an All Black, you know, like they're going to they had elite levels of fitness, so for them to hold onto that over their life. But if we've got someone who's not really done much exercise, they can get huge improvements right throughout life, regardless of age.
I actually wonder whether it's sometimes it's harder for the elite sports people because there's i mean the sacrifice and time sacrifice to maintain yourself in that sort of peak physical condition, and it must be exhausting. And if you get to a normal life where you sort of just tone it down, there'll be and as you will have seen, you get problems with keeping the same diet when you're not burning the same thing. Before you know, what you're looking at is not a shadow of your formal self, but about three shadows.
And three chins together.
I mean, in a way, I wonder if is that a harder adjustment for people who can remember the glory days and think, God, I'm a tragedy.
I think it comes down actually a lot too, because obviously, once you've finished a professional sports career, you don't need the same level of physical abilities. So it depends why you're doing it after that. So if you've still got purpose, if you're someone that thrives on competition, you know that that's someone that you know if you look at Rick himccall. I was about to.
Say, the poster boy must be Richie mccaugh. Isn't he insufferable? We see that calling Richie? Tell us what keeps you going? Because it literally he went from being this behemoth of a flanker and world rugby legend to some of you must didn't recognize. But he's he must There must be something hard wide in him and that he just loves that.
Yeah, I've never met Richie, but obviously he loves competition and challenging himself. But then on the other side of it, you know, if you've if you're very injured, if you were in that physical condition purely to play your sport, it might not be a hobby. So therefore, you know what life looks like after professional sport very it varies a lot.
Well, what's the most obviously the thing is, it's not one thing to sit on your couch and think, you know what, I'm going to get up and I'm going to go see Alex. I'm going to go see a personal train and I'm going to get my life in hand. But what is the what is the most important thing? And to of the psychology of it, because it's one thing to have the ambition and have a couple of bad workouts in your back on the couch. Again, what do you see as being the common denominator mentally to make the change.
It has to start with a sense of purpose as to why you're doing it and why it's important for you. If you don't have that, it's one of those we all know that we should be out walking or going to the gym, But for a lot of us, the reality is we got busy lives. We've got kids or grandkids or you know, work commitments, whatever it might be. We have a body that is you feel overwhelmed, it's out of shape, you're worried about your health, you don't know where to start. But that sense of purpose of knowing why do I want to do this? And that's some really interesting things that we'll probably talk about today, just knowing how much of a difference it can make, especially just a couple of three things, your muscle mass, your cardiovascular fitness, and your balance and agility, and what a difference that can make. Often we talk about sort of building a war chest. So unfortunately, as we get a little on, you know, we start to our risk factors for all diseases start to go up. Obviously through our fifties and sixties, we're more likely to be exposed to things. The higher your level of cardiovascular fitness, the higher your muscle mess and the better your strength are your balance and agility, the better position you are in to be able to ward off, fight and come back from those things. And that is all causes of mortality, whether it's cancer, whether it's heart disease, whether it's accidents, all of those, whether it's mental health, they're all better off when we're in great shape.
Because I mean, for me, I always thought when I mean, I haven't been running much lately, I've probably got to get back into it. But I found that the if I thought about I've got to go for a run, and I imagined the beginning of the middle and the end of the run, I'd be like, oh goodness me. So for me, I just said, Tim, just put your shoes on and get out the door, and the rest will follow. Is there something in that of setting the most basic of tasks and then the rest follows or is that just particularly my psychology.
Yeah, and it's definitely a great way to go about it. And I really think it depends. You know, you get sort of a type personalities that want to plan everything out and they you know, they're very meticulous, and other people are sort of they just enjoy the fun side of it, you know, they want to go to a class.
I've seen you. I've seen the amount of resources you've got through your app on the Body Talk, and I'm thinking you're type. It's a lot of it's a lot of organization in that.
Yeah. I'm definitely an exercise nerd. I just I just love it. Yeah, so my I have to have something to train towards. Hence while I'm doing a run. I find it very hard just I know that exercise is great for my health, but I need to be able to check something off, whether it's an event or there's there's got to be something there for me. But yeah, so it does come down. You know, a lot of people love the social side of it, so they go to group fitness classes and that's a great way to do so just step in the door of that group fitness class. For others, you know, the biggest barrier might be they don't have time. So, like you say, just put your shoes on and get out the door. But the worst thing can do is sit on the couch.
We love your calls on this because I think every look to be honest. I think most people if you are wanting to get into shape and you're not, everyone worries that you've let yourself slip. It's not necessarily just an age question, but I use someone who's worried about getting back into exercise. And if you'd like to give us a call and pick Alex's brain if there's a question, we'd love to hear from you. But have you successfully made a fitness come back? And what's the secret to your success. What because in the end, I think it has to be a triumph of mind over matter, doesn't it if your mind's not in there, I don't know. Unless you're mindlessly just and can exercise without thinking about it too much, and you're just a creature of habit, I don't know. But we want your calls eight hundred and eighty ten eighty anything. Any other questions you've got about getting fit and diet and looking after yourself. We're with Alex Flint. He's a founder and coach at body Talk. I'm by the way, I'm Alex has currently done a program for me through the app and everything, as well as scanning me. I don't think we need to do the scanner anytime soon. I'll pup to cut out sugar first, Alex. But I can tell you that it definitely is making a difference, unless Alex OFFI is going to say, mate, you need to work harder. But we want your calls. Eight hundred eighty ten eighty text nine two nine two. It's twenty four past four News Talk s ed B. Welcome back to the health of news Talk, said B. Is it too late to turn your life around? Have you turned your life around. We're with Alex Flint, He's founder and coach at body Talk by the way, body talk dot co dot nz if you want to check out the resources they've got there, and Alex can design a program for you no matter where you are as well, which is the beauty of that app as well. But if you've got any questions for Alex eight hundred and eighty ten eighty right, let's go to Harry Gooday.
So is that for Harry?
Yeah, that's you, Harry Gooday good.
Hey, Yeah. I wouldn't say have been a great exercise During my life. I've played a fair amount of sports, done the topway bike rice a few times. I'm seventy three years old. I'm starting to struggle with lower back pain and I just wonder if there's something that I can do to actually relieve that or improve that so that it's not such a restriction on exercise cad I Harry, Yeah, sorry, do you get that?
Sorry?
Yeah? I forgot to swatch alexis micro on So I started talking of my fault.
Way we go, Harry, when do you get the back pain?
About four months ago, I guess, and I re prior to that, I don't recall having any problems. I did have a a few years ago, probably about six or seven years ago. I helped a neighbor moose and furniture and tweak my back. I went saw a sports medicine guy and it sort of came right by itself. But yeah, that's the history of it. Yeah, so fleared up in the last few months.
So, Harry, the first part of that always when you're dealing with an injury, you've just got to be really careful. At the start of the commencement of when you start to bring in some strengthening exercises. There is if you look up, there's a guy called Stuart McGill, doctor Stuart McGill, and he came up with three exercises which, funny enough, are called the Stuart McGill Big Three and they are time tested when it comes to strengthening core and lower back and reducing lower back pain. So the first exercise is what we call an abdominal curl up. So if you can imagine lying on the ground facing upwards, one leg is out straight. The other one is that your knee is pulled up, so you've got one knee bent both that foot is flat on the ground, and then we simply try and sit forward and up so you can't come up very far off the ground, and we hold for five seconds at a time, so we do these little abdominal curl ups. We do a couple of those on each side, so that's about a minute's worth of it's almost like a static crunch.
We hold those.
Then the exercise number two is a plank, so no doubt probably tried an abdominal plank at some stage where we're sort of prone. We're facing face down and we have our elbows on the ground and our feet on the ground and we try and keep the rest of us in a hover position. So that's the second exercise, and then the third one is called a bird dog, where we're on hands and knees and then we straighten one arm and the opposite leg out, so it's almost like we're pointing like a hunting dog. So arm goes out in front, the leg goes behind. But if you were to look up the Stuart McGill Big three for back lower back, it's about five minutes worth of exercise a day, and that will make a big inroad into you getting over them, because largely when it comes to lower back issues. The first thing you've got to do is build a really strong abdominal corset, and that's your lower back muscles, the abdominals, your obliques and your front abdominals and all the inner ones. So those three exercises have proved to be really, really good.
Thank you for that. I will left that up.
What's the name again? The Big Three?
By who?
Stuart McGill.
Stuart McGill. Yeah.
The other issue is that it is my favorite exercise is cychling fun.
You know.
Well, you've done the top bike race. That was a bit of a humble brag, I think there, Harry.
Well, not really. I mean I used to about fourteen thousand, just went around it every year. I mean it was just such a wonderful event that, you know, just so many bloody hills. Yeah, but yeah, no, I've done that a few times, but I haven't done it for probably five or six years. And I've seen the guys. I did for one of three and passed away and yeah, you know, things go on, but it's time to get off my backside and start getting back into it. I think in a series.
Yep, absolutely, Harry, cycling fantastic way to strengthen your legs, strengthen your heart, your lungs. And what we do know is that those that for any age have the highest aerobic fitness, they have the lowest risk of all mortality. So you keep yourself going for longer than fitty you are, and that bike is a great way to do it because it takes all the stress out of your joints, so you definitely get onto it.
Cheers. Actually, the back pain thing just quickly. I mean I noticed. I mean, I'm getting a little bit older, I guess, but if I'm sitting in a static position, you know, when you're younger, just get up and get moving. But it's one of those things I do notice. It's, oh, you know, just just a bit of stiffness from Is that? Is that just something you get as you get older, regardless of what you exercise us.
Yeah, it's definitely postural. You know, you just examine the positions that we sit in which are not necessarily optimal. I mean, it doesn't take long in the day before you catch yourself slouching, and it's you know, it's it's a compound effect over days, months, years of bad posh and that happens in exercise as well. You know, you exercise in poor positions, we end up getting injured. And it's no different.
Just quickly, somebody suggested to me, you know, the plank, so you're on your elbow. It's basically press up position, but you're on your elbows and holding yourself there for an interminable length of time. Are you better? Somebody suggested to me that you're better to introduce a bit of instability that holding is so because I try and hold myself as still as possible, because I know as you get tired, quicker if I start twitching. But that's what's what's what's the go with that static versus a little bit of instability lifting a leg here.
Yeah, So it comes down to progressive overload. So every exercise that we do we need a stimulus from. So if our body is already accomplished and it can do that, then we need to find a way to challenge it. So if you've never done a plank in your life, you start with your knees on the ground and then slowly, over time we get you know, knees come off the ground, and then we start to bring in instability. So if if you can, you want you want to bring in some things like that. You could put your elbows on a Swiss ball, you could go on one leg, you could put something underneath your feet.
Okay, so I'm still a beginner level. When I get through it a minute, I'm sort of three times and that's you know, so I need to do something else.
Then I'll bet I'll bet you can do better.
I probably can. And actually there have been some times when I'm like a bitch, if Alex was here, come on, you can do another ten seconds. What's wrong with you? Anyway, It's not about me. Let's talk about you. I eight one hundred and eighty ten eighty Donna. Hello, Hi, Donna?
Hello, how are you good?
Thank you?
That's good. Hey, listen, I've got a question about lower back pain as well. I've suffered since my early twenties was quite bad lower back pain. And I've flipped a disk and then I've obviously I've ruptured at a couple of couple of times over the years. And what I try and do twenty minutes of pilarates every morning, which consists of the bood dog and the plane king. And so I'm trying to build my core and I do thirty minute. It's every day of power walking as well on my lunchtime. But I'm just wondering. I recently just you know, bent over the wrong way in the morning to feed the cat and bang my back went on me for about a week. And I'm just wondering if you have any recommendations for how to get sort of back into it as quickly as possible after injuries like that, because at the moment I'm doing sailing as a sport as well, and I have to wear a back brace because there's a lot of bending over and it just yeah, it's just quite frustrating because sometimes I can't go sailing if my back's really really bad. So I'm just wondering if you've got any recommendations. Am I doing the right things? And b is there any anything else I could be doing?
Perhaps? Yeah, absolutely, Well, it sounds like you're really, you know, you're onto it in terms of you're getting that daily work in and doing things like we talked about bird dogs and planking and so forth. Is fantastic. When you've had a long term history of back pain, there's probably a little bit more to it. Knowing sort of what if there's any underlying damage. There is one thing, but probably the simplest way to think about it is what I find is often back pain or back incidents happen doing unusual things like it literally will be like you know, bending over to feed the cat, or someone's been gardening and they're you know, they're on an odd angle. So our backs get get caught in odd positions without being able to give you like a full progressive program that goes on for months. What you need to do is start to challenge your back and your hips. So one of the big things is making sure you've got plenty of glute strength. I don't know if you do anything with a glute band at all, some sort of glut bridges or some crab walks the marches.
No, I'll probably have to start doing that, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, So just look up glute bands and glute band exit sizes. And then the next thing that you really need to look at doing is starting to incorporate exercises which are getting you to hinge at the hips. So take that to the end point would say, well, the biggest hinge of your hips is like doing a deadlift. Now, if you're going to pick it, if you hope to be able to pick things off the ground or probably you know when you're in a sailing position, you know you've got your legs in a strong position and your back's upright. You really need to be strong in those positions, but also learn how to do them well. And that's so that you get movement proficiency, because sometimes we just don't quite understand that the position that we're in and our discs can be exposed and then we can end up with an injury. So the next thing for you would probably be to go into looking at movements strength, movements that incorporate hip hinging, whether that's deadlifting or you know, like actually a bird dog is the first one of those, so you sort of and you move on from there. So doing those types of X sizes strategically over time, making them slightly more advanced, that's probably your way out of that. But I would also look at that glute strength.
Okay, cool, excellent, Thank you for that.
Appreciate that.
Thanks Dona. A couple of questions here, as a rower a rowing machine's good for overall fitness? How do they fit into the whole thing?
They're fantastic. Yeah, I think if there is one piece of equipment that you're going to get provided again actually a little bit what we're talking about with Donna. You do need to make sure that you row with good posture, and I do see people injure their backs quite badly if they sort of slouch when they row. So a rowing machine absolutely fantastic. It hits everything. Strength, fitness is a great all round tool. It's low impact. But just learn to row well, you know, whether that's YouTube videos or you get someone to coach you.
But yeah, absolutely on that machine.
Thing.
Somebody else has asked about the cross training machine? Are those cross training things? Are those the one where you're sort of like cross country skiing, like you're sort of going up and down with your hands and a push pull, and then you're also marching up and down with your feets.
Yeah, so your legs are sort of sliding back and forth and then you've got your arms. Yeah, it's like.
Skin Nordic skiing. That's the one I'm thinking.
Yeah, so those who are obviously invented because the Nordic skiers have got some of the best Votwo max fitness. They're aerobic fitness in the world. You know, they're up there and you're upright, but there's no impact, so it's great in terms of like running can be hard on your joints, but being upright in that position means there's more gravity working against you, so your heart's got to work harder. So they're great. One thing on that though, is there's no one best exercise. Unfortunately, if you're talking about you know, for home, that's great one piece of equipment if that's going to get you on it. But variation is key because what happens over time our bodies adapt to whatever we do. So if you think about someone who is, for example, a great marathon runner, then what they've trained is efficiency in running, so that is no longer such a difficult task for them. Put them in a swimming pool and that might be very hard for them. So if they were looking for a way to challenge their body or you know, and it wasn't that they were competing in running, then you've got to look for what are the things that challenge you. So when it comes to fitness, do lots of different stuff. When it comes to strength training, do lots of different stuff. Yoga pilates are all great in terms of mobility, flexibility and the variation of the spice Alife.
Okay, we're going to take some more calls in just a moment, but we need to take another break and we'll be back in just to ticket. It's twenty to five newstalks.
It beat.
Yes, welcome back to the Weekend Collective. This is the health of Alex Flint from Bodytalk, Dot, cod At and Zaid. He's with us. He's a founder and coach there and does great work with turning your life around. By the way, if you are someone who's thinking of it, whether it's too late or not, give us a call you've got any questions. Just before we go to Tom, here's a question from I'm a thirty five year old male. I have a fifteen year old son who's starting to lift more than me at the gym. He's almost half a foot taller. How do I keep up? Or is it just time to accept reality?
Yeah, there's age does wary is but I think you should be able to hold on for a little bit longer. But yeah, that fifteen year old injection of testosterone. No doubt he's coming for you.
See is it? I mean again? At a distance, it's just a text. It's difficult to give advice, but I reckon that there's more chance at the fifteen year old son. You know, they're energetic and he's putting everything into it, and he's got his dad he wants to overtake. Is there a chance that dad just needs to re examine whether he's really working hard enough, you know, I mean in terms of just pushing that weight up, you know, dropping the sets, getting to exhaustion, you know, when I don't know.
Yeah, well we have we have to overload our body, like we have to provide stimulus. But I think one of the things you know that that'spring to moment I just hear that is how fantastic that is is a you know, a father and son training together and your boy's probably getting a ton out of trying to catch you. So what a what a great relationship with a good thing to keep up and hold him at bay for as long as you can.
It's funny that actually I'm the Jim. I go to there, you see a young callow youth turn up, and I saw some kid turn up. He looked pretty gangly, and then I saw the weight he's stuck on. I thought, I need up my game.
Yeah, mid love crisis and again you have to be careful. Yeah. I think it's particularly a male fault is going to the gym and just thinking about how much weight is on the bar, and it's something that yeah, it matters over time that we're lifting more weight, but it really shouldn't be the focus of weight training.
Well, the other question is I've remind him myself of this a couple of times. I'm like, well, hang on, I'm up that weight and I got through it, and I'm thinking, how did I really focus on technique? Because if you see quite a lot where a trainer will say, well, let's just drop that weight down and work on your technique, and the persons like, god, this is this is weighing a ton. Yeah, that's well.
I mean, your body has no idea what the weight is on the bar. It just feels tension. So there's lots of different ways to do that and make sure that weight training stays safer for the long term when we focus on great technique creating tension in our bodies, and then that way we get a hard workout without necessarily having to go to the absolute extremes.
With thirty five year old dad check out, we have a chat with Alex and see if he can. He could be your secret weapon. Your son will be like, geez, Dad, what's happening?
Oh?
Nothing, I'm just caring as the usual. Okay, let's take some more course, John.
Hello, yeah, goody, how's it going good?
Thanks?
John.
I'm forty nine years old and I've always been by Let's put it that way, shall we. Ever? As a kid, even as a kid in high school, my nickname was Fred's big white and full of food. It was basically, I've always been that person who is a little bit of overweight. And now I've hit for forty nine. Is as I said. I do walking and hiking, that's my thing, but it's not enough to keep the weight off. And I'm still the size I've always been, which is B and I like high. But now I'm starting to get high blood pressure, and I suffer from anemia and I've got low hemoglobin levels and so I don't have a lot of energy. But I need to do more. But the more has to be effective, and I just seem to be always on the back foot. What should I try?
John?
Good on you for getting out there and exercising. The biggest thing that we find with daily exercise, whether it's cardiovascular training, walking, swimming, lifting weights is there's a tremendous compensatory effect when it comes to our appetite, so we will eat more when we exercise, and that is one of the biggest issues. So and you almost need to be smarter with your diet, with your nutrition when you are trying to exercise for a change in your health or for a change in your body weight. So usually barking up the more exercise is what I need tree likely is not the right approach. It's a look into your nutritional habits, and the reason for.
That is more deficit.
Yeah, and usually the first and best way to do that is not to actually start eating less. It's to improve the quality of foods that you are eating. So if you just focus on eating more fruit and vegetables, more good lean proteins, more quality whole grains, what you'll find is that you're starting to crowd out the good with the bad. And you shouldn't actually have to starve yourself. But especially if you've got things like a you know, iron issues, doing more exercise, to be honest, is probably just going to leave you feeling really exhausted.
So you know, that's true.
Yeah, that is what I find. I've started trying to do more, but it's just it's counter productive.
It it doesn't work, no, and it's you know, it's just so easy to eat back the calories that you've burnt off. So unfortunately, unless you're in your twenties. I can remember as a personal training in my twenties thinking that all my forty fifty and six year old clients were not telling the truth that they couldn't lose weight. And then all of a sudden I was one, and you realize that, actually, the calorice equation is just very, very difficult if it's just through exercise. So you can do an hour of exercise and you can eat back those calories in about ten minutes. So it's Yeah, what I would really suggest, John, is you start to look at just improving the quality of your diet, whether that's you look at working with someone just to get some help, but definitely don't starve yourself. Just start by looking at improving what you're doing and measuring it some way, whether it's a food diary, it's on the scales.
Yeah, cheers, John, thanks for your Actually for me, I can echo that because I I'm aware. I'm not sure if I've put on weight or anything, but you do naturally, we've put on a bit of muscle. But I think it's I think my thing. I've got to be aware with it. Its just sugar. For some reason, I think if I get hungry, you know, I am drawn a little bit to more the sugar retreats. And I'm not sure if there's a reason for that, but.
Yeah, well often, I mean in daily life, it's like a stress modulator, you know what I mean, Like if you're tired, or you're fatigued, or you're into high stress. Treat foods are things that make us feel better. They increase happy hormones. So what happens is we tend to lean on those and they're just hyper palatable. It's easy to overeat them, and there's calories that don't really help us.
And peanuts, by the way, But anyway, like I'll ask you about that in our own time, which is coming up now. We'll be back in just a ticke. It's nine minutes to vide and news talks. He'd be yes, news talk Sai'd be look only a couple of minutes ago. I'm with Alex Flint. By the way, if you're curious on tracking Alex down with what he does, you can go to body talk dot co, dot nzet and he's done some great work with a lot of people. And I would say possibly in quitcluding me now, I'd say, Alex, even though we've had a bit of a chat about some of my snacking, we might have to work on this text from Victoria. Hi, I'm a sixty one year old woman, fairly fit through running, but core and strength need more attention. I've heard women should be lifting heavy weights. Alex, address this and can you please explain the app given I'm not an Auckland chairs Victoria, And that's yeah, Sorry I didn't switch the mark on there again, sorry, Alex.
So it's what happens when we age, is we lose muscle mass. That just happens over time. I don't know if you know out there you've seen there's a really famous picture of a seventy year old triathletes thighs compared to a seventy seven year old sedentary man and the difference in the cross section when they've done an MRI on them, and while they're relatively the same size, the inside of those one is full of body fat and the other one still full of muscle. And largely what happens is just through inactivity, and that can happen at any age, but especially as we get older, our muscle muscle mass starts to dwindle. Now, interestingly, even if you are running or you're doing cycling, there's still that effect of phenomenon still happens, the atrophy of muscles as we get older. So strength training for men and women as we age is really important.
Now.
For women it's particularly important through menopause and postmenopause because of things like bone density and because on the other side of menopause, this loss of muscle mass can create a lot of health disorders down the track. So lifting heavy is a relative term. So when we're talking lifting heavy, if we think about pilates, that's high reps. What we need is heavy weights fifteen ten or less repetitions and over time where we're stressing our body through increasing those weights. So heavy few right now will be different to what heavy to you is in ten much time.
I'll tell you what. I'm sorry, we've run out of time there, so we haven't even got on to living longer, have we Alex, well after that, but start getting fitter and that will probably stick. Tick the first box. Hey Alex, thanks so much. By the way, when I say body talk, it's t O r q u E as opposed to chitty chats. So thanks Alex, good to see.
You mate, Thank you very much.
Tim Janet Zakara is next. We're going to be talking trusts, News Talks eb on smart money coming.
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