After 40 club

[Barkadion]

Certainly the guys that KB mentions here are extreme outliers, but there is a general point to be here. Those guys were probably extreme outliers their entire lives, and they are carrying it on well into their middle-age. Maybe the ex-SAS guy's time in a five mile ruck is a bit slower than when he was in his twenties, but he can still cover the ground along with all the other awesome stuff he has always done. I've see a lot of guys on forums panicking as their 30th birthday approaches (I find that really funny), as though they can expect to fall completely to shit on that day. The same thing, even more so, as they approach 40. I think we are so obsessed with youth here in the West that we way overplay the debilitation that must come with aging, or at least we expect it to happen so much earlier than it has to.

I'm not saying I'm anything near as awesome as the mofo's that KB mentions, but my case fits that pattern. I turned 43 in two months, and I don't feel like I've really slowed down very much. Just the opposite really. Sure, I don't hammer the weights for ME workouts four times/week like I did when I was in my twenties and early/mid thirties, but I also walked around as an overtrained, injured, and generally beat up semi-invalid for many of those years. Sure I don't load my back as often or as heavily as I used to, but I don't feel like that's a function of my age, but really just the consequence of some stupid behavior. If I hadn't picked up stress fractures in my lumbar playing American football, I bet there would be no problem for me. I have "slowed down" in some ways not because of my age, but because realized that I was doing a lot of dumb ass things. In other words, its injury accumulation, bad mobility patterns, and such that I picked up from poor training for decades, and not my age, that I think causes me problems. I do better on auto-regulated programs with more days off now, but I probably would've done better on such programs back when I was a younger man. In terms of my intensity of conditioning, mobility, strength relative to my bodyweight, body composition, endurances, etc., etc., etc., I am absolutely better than I've ever been, and I'm only getting better. Now I've thrown in martial arts for the first time in my life (or at least since I stopped wrestling as a kid), and that has only been positive.

Of course I'm going to fade, and so will the exemplars KB mentions. That's is the way of all flesh. No doubt, my actual performance in my 40s is short of what an equally well-trained athlete in his twenties can do. For example, I simply cannot match the college wrestles I sometimes workout/roll with in terms of speed and agility. Their speed beats me. That performance dip is far less than you might think; I can absolutely hang with (or sometimes out perform those same college wrestlers in terms of strength, endurance, and anaerobic capacity -- they have to work dam hard to beat me. In short, in terms of your work capacity, strength, and endurance, my experience is that you will fade a lot more slowly (if at all!) than you think. My point is that threshold can be pushed far deeper into our middle age or even senior years than our youth obsessed culture would have us believe!

Now maybe in November I'll fall part on my 43rd birthday, but I'm not betting on that!

If youth knew; if age could. - Sigmund Freud

Sorry - couldn't resist..

[WallBilly]

[ . . . . . . . . My point is that threshold can be pushed far deeper into our middle age or even senior years than our youth obsessed culture would have us believe!

Agreed at 54. I'm stronger than I've ever been and still getting stronger.

I hate to sound like Negative Nancy, but honestly, the thing that really keeps me motivated is:

I don't want to fall apart before it is absolutely necessary.

I'm not sure about Apex Hills, but I plan to squat until the day I croak. I'm loving Black/Operator. But based on this thread, I'm going to really scale back my LSS runs, maybe 30 minutes once a week or every other week. The HIC is faster and more interesting anyhow . . .

[Barkadion]

[ . . . . . . . . My point is that threshold can be pushed far deeper into our middle age or even senior years than our youth obsessed culture would have us believe!

Agreed at 54. I'm stronger than I've ever been and still getting stronger.

I hate to sound like Negative Nancy, but honestly, the thing that really keeps me motivated is:

I don't want to fall apart before it is absolutely necessary.

I'm not sure about Apex Hills, but I plan to squat until the day I croak. I'm loving Black/Operator. But based on this thread, I'm going to really scale back my LSS runs, maybe 30 minutes once a week or every other week. The HIC is faster and more interesting anyhow . . .

I agree but having LSS 60min run once in a while is a blessing. I feel overall amazing for a week at least after the run. It shakes my vascular system in a good way. As much as I like to stay strength oriented I find that keeping LSS around is vital. IMHO.

[fffrmaz]

PFFFT! I'm only 39 and 4 months.

[Barkadion]

Kevin Levrone is 52. I know, I know.. drugs and all that jazz .. but still..

[TBPenguin]

I turned 43 in two months, and I don't feel like I've really slowed down very much. Just the opposite really. ...No doubt, my actual performance in my 40s is short of what an equally well-trained athlete in his twenties can do. F In short, in terms of your work capacity, strength, and endurance, my experience is that you will fade a lot more slowly (if at all!) than you think. My point is that threshold can be pushed far deeper into our middle age or even senior years than our youth obsessed culture would have us believe!

That was about the age when I was at my strongest. You seem smarter than me in the way you go about things, so my bet is you will not be fading much any time soon. But you have a bigger point here I think. Obviously I am not the target audience for "operator training" and maybe few of the After 40 Club really is. But if we look at it as a model then we are using the right tool. Not sure I'm making sense. I could train like a powerlifter if all I wanted was brute strength. My brute strength would be less than that of a good powerlifter (though with age classes who knows) but the powerlifting training would be the right tool. If I want to have the strength, the conditioning, the all around performance ability - I think this is the right tool to get there. We just need to scale its application.

One thing I'd like to learn more about, if you don't mind, is how you are applying auto-regulation to this. Are there any particular markers or measures you use?

[TangoZero]

I agree muscle mass is important when you hit the age of your personal decline. If you're running a 3 or 4 day TB template, and your nutrition's dialed in, you should be putting on muscle mass. I use the phrase "avoiding hypertrophy" in the books with sarcoplasmic hypertrophy in mind, NOT muscle mass in general. There's some debate about the sarcoplasmic vs myofibril hypertrophy these days - but I subscribe to the theory that there is a difference. I've seen it with my own training and others when it comes to running typical BB splits vs traditional low rep heavy weight strength training. Have a look at gymnasts or professional MMA fighters - there's a spectrum of muscle mass ranging from pretty big, to thin and wiry. How you set-up your TB protocols will allow you to manipulate where you want to be on that spectrum.

In my experience session volume + food intake + manipulating conditioning load trumps lowering the weight and rest interval. This is the general TB guide for putting on some beef:

1. Use a 3 or 4 day template (Op or Zulu)
2. Bump up to at least 4 work sets per exercise. This one's important.
3. Run Black Protocol (1 E every other week/maximum duration - 30 minutes). So 2 HICs every week. 1 E every other week (optional).
4. Ensure that your food intake matches your weight gain goal.
5. Choose HICs that are advantageous/complementary to your goal of maximizing muscle and power. Use GCs, sprints, things that contain dips, swings, pull-ups etc.
6. Use Creatine Monohydrate.

Here's another thing. Just because you can train like a Navy SEAL doesn't mean you should. If it doesn't align with your goals you shouldn't be doing it. If you're training for general health, muscle mass, and being a machine in your mid 40s and beyond, then you have no business running Green protocol. You have no business running Base more than once or twice a year.

Training like an operator is not the same as training to be healthy. Operators frequently have atrocious hormonal profiles (low testosterone/high cortisol/depleted mineral-vitamin levels) due to the high mileage and constant training. If you don't have to train like that why would you? If you do decide to train like them (Green protocol, extreme endurance etc.) then understand you will be paying the price in other areas like strength, hormones, bones and joints.

TB is designed to be customized for your personal situation (which can change). If you're an Operator, the tools are here. If you're a power/speed athlete, the tools are here. If you're somewhere in between, the tools are here. If you're 50+ and you decide you want to do a Go-Ruck or Spartan Beast, then simply re-arrange the pieces/templates/protocols to fit your new goal.

Great post.... To address one of your points here's a study comparing long rest intervals vs short:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2660 ... =hootsuite

For those that don't want to read, long rest intervals (3 minutes) were better for both strength AND hypertrophy. Which makes sense if you think about it because you can get more volume in if you're rested and avoid muscle failure.

[TangoZero]

I've always suspected hypertrophy has more to do with volume. I tend to gain muscle relatively easily, especially with high frequency squatting programs like Operator or SS, usually in my legs, chest, and shoulders. I've been running Operator on and off for close to two years now and I notice a significant difference between 3 set blocks and 4-5 set blocks. My virgin run with Op was 3 set all the way, and I remember being surprised (pleasantly) at how little weight I was putting on. I stuck to the 2 minute rule, and did a lot of cardio (I was training for annual SWAT qualifications/physicals, wanted to come in light on my feet but strong).

Later I started playing with the template, and did a few blocks of Op with a 4-5 set range, and sure as shit I started getting big again. I increased the RI to 3 minutes, but no change. Later in the year dropped back to 3 work sets, and sure enough I was getting lean and mean again (strength still progressing). Now I'm back up to 4-5, and again, the thighs and chest are getting big.

[DocOctagon]

Kevin Levrone is 52. I know, I know.. drugs and all that jazz .. but still..

Nice. But I'd love to see a side-by-side before and after pic of his heart.

[J-Madd]

.PFFFT! I'm only 39 and 4 months.

Dam it. No matter how old you get, I'll still be older.