Muscles aren´t just for young men in tight shirts

How Much Can You Bench?

“How much can you bench?”

That was one of the first questions you heard when I began lifting weights in my early twenties.

Bodybuilding gyms were beginning to appear, and young men were discovering a new way of examining themselves in mirrors. You still hear the same question today.

There is nothing wrong with young men wanting to become muscular, enjoying their training and checking whether their efforts are producing visible results. Most of us who have lifted weights have looked in the mirror from time to time and been pleased when something seemed to be growing in the right direction.

Some people take it considerably further. They use anabolic steroids and other substances to accelerate muscle growth and change their appearance. That can produce dramatic results, but it can also have serious consequences. We have seen bodybuilders develop major health problems and, in some cases, die far too young.

There is an important difference between building a body and building a body that remains useful.

Iceland has long had a strong tradition of strength competitions. Despite our small population, Icelandic strongmen have achieved remarkable results internationally. In their world, the competition is about using the muscles rather than merely displaying them.

Admittedly, there is quite a lot to display as well.

Sixty Kilograms and Full of Confidence

When I began lifting weights, I weighed only a little over sixty kilograms.

I gained weight quickly, almost entirely in muscle, without using any drugs. I hardly had any fat on me at the time, so every additional kilogram seemed to announce itself immediately.

That did not necessarily make me as strong as I imagined.

On one occasion, my father asked me to help move some stones on the shore in front of his house. He was not testing my strength or standing over me to see what I could lift. The stones simply needed to be moved.

Despite all my weight training and expanding confidence, I had considerable difficulty lifting some of them.

Like many young men, I had assumed that looking muscular and being practically strong were more or less the same thing.

They are related, but they are not identical.

A machine in a gym allows you to sit in exactly the right position, grip a conveniently placed handle and move a weight along a predetermined path. A large, awkward stone on an Icelandic shore is less cooperative. It has no handle, no padded seat and no interest in helping you maintain perfect form.

The stone provided a rather direct lesson.

I have always felt that muscles should be trained so that they are useful. That may explain why I have generally preferred the physiques of decathletes, gymnasts and swimmers to those of competitive bodybuilders.

Those athletes are muscular, but their muscles clearly have a job to perform.

Bodybuilders may see something different when they look in the mirror than I do. That is their right. The rest of us, however, should remember that the mirror tells only part of the story.

The Mirror Does Not Tell the Whole Story

Muscles are not merely decoration beneath the skin.

They are the workforce of the body. Our muscles allow us to move, work, train, travel, carry what needs to be carried and continue doing the things that make life enjoyable.

Muscle tissue also plays an important metabolic role. It helps the body handle glucose and respond to the energy we consume. Active muscles pull on bones and contribute to the mechanical stimulus that helps maintain bone strength. Strong muscles support movement around joints and help us tolerate the physical demands that life places upon us.

A visible biceps may be gratifying, but the muscles that allow us to keep living actively are providing the more valuable service.

For most men over fifty, the important question is not whether their muscles are large enough to impress anybody.

It is whether they have enough strength to continue living on their own terms.

I have nothing against muscles that can be seen. But I consider it more important that they work when nobody is watching.

Fifty Is Not Old

Men in their fifties are not old men.

Many are working full-time, travelling, training, raising children or even becoming fathers again. They may feel strong and recognise none of the physical limitations usually associated with old age.

That is precisely why fifty is a good time to think about muscles.

The point is not that a man should begin preparing to become frail the day he turns fifty. The point is to avoid waiting until strength has already been lost before deciding that it mattered.

Training after fifty is not merely an attempt to repair decline. It is an investment in the decades ahead.

A man who is strong and active at fifty-five may not notice an immediate difference in ordinary daily life. But the strength he builds and preserves becomes part of the reserve he carries into his sixties, seventies and beyond.

This is not a message about surrendering to old age.

It is a message about preparing well enough to meet it standing up.

When Age Begins to Collect Its Share

Sarcopenia is the progressive loss of muscle strength, muscle mass and physical function associated with ageing.

Some loss of muscle mass and strength is a natural part of growing older. The process can begin surprisingly early, with gradual changes becoming measurable from the thirties onward. It usually becomes more important later in life and can accelerate considerably after sixty.

Age does not act alone.

Physical inactivity, inadequate nutrition, hormonal changes, changes in the nervous system and chronic illness can all contribute. Serious disease, surgery and prolonged periods of immobility can make muscles disappear with alarming speed.

The loss often develops so gradually that it is easy to ignore. A person adapts without noticing that he is adapting. He chooses the lighter object, avoids the more demanding activity or simply accepts that something he once did easily now requires more effort.

For a healthy man in his fifties, this may still seem distant. But prevention always feels slightly premature—until the moment when it becomes treatment.

There is a considerable difference between ageing and surrendering in advance.

A Physical Reserve Account

I think of muscle strength as a kind of physical reserve account.

You hope that you will not need to make a large withdrawal, but it is reassuring to know that the reserve exists when life sends you an unexpected bill.

Illness, an operation or a few weeks of inactivity can take a substantial amount out of that account. Younger people often recover quickly. With increasing age, rebuilding what was lost can take longer, and some people never fully recover their previous level.

A person who begins with little muscular reserve can move surprisingly quickly towards physical bankruptcy.

Age takes its share, but we sometimes send the body an additional invoice for years spent sitting still.

The good news is that our muscles remain responsive. An older body does not react exactly like a twenty-five-year-old body, but it can still become stronger. Strength training can improve strength and physical function even when someone begins relatively late in life.

The purpose is not to defeat ageing.

The purpose is to meet it with a larger reserve.

Muscles Are Built by Asking Them to Work

The most effective way to resist muscle loss is regular strength training.

That does not necessarily mean joining a bodybuilding gym. Resistance can come from free weights, exercise machines, resistance bands, body weight or ordinary objects used safely at home.

Muscles do not care whether the resistance comes from an expensive machine or a rubber band. They respond to the demands placed upon them.

The important elements are regularity and gradual progression. The body needs a reason to retain strength. If the same easy movement is repeated forever without becoming challenging, the body becomes very efficient at doing precisely that easy movement—and little more.

That does not mean every session should become a heroic battle against gravity.

For many men over fifty, two or three sensible strength sessions each week are more useful than one brutal session followed by six days of pain and regret. The major muscle groups should be challenged, movements should be controlled and resistance should increase gradually as strength improves.

The exercises do not have to be complicated. Pushing, pulling, lifting, carrying and stabilising the body cover a great deal of what our muscles are designed to do.

A gym can make this easier, but gym membership is not a biological requirement for remaining strong.

The chair is an excellent piece of furniture. It simply should not become our principal training partner.

Training Is Only Part of the Equation

Our muscles also need the raw materials and conditions required for maintenance and repair.

Adequate protein matters, especially as we grow older. Ageing muscles may respond less strongly to a small amount of protein than younger muscles do. That does not mean every older man needs to live on protein powder or carry a chicken breast in his pocket. It means that protein should not be treated as an occasional decorative item on the plate.

Fish, meat, eggs, dairy products and legumes can all contribute. The appropriate amount depends on body size, activity, health and kidney function, among other things. More is not automatically better, but too little makes it difficult to maintain muscle mass regardless of the quality of the training programme.

Vitamin D is relevant to muscles and bones, particularly when a person is deficient. It is sensible to pay attention to vitamin D status, especially in a country where sunlight is not always a reliable business partner. That is different from assuming that increasingly large doses of a supplement must produce increasingly large muscles.

Sleep also matters. Training provides the stimulus, but recovery is part of the adaptation. A body that is repeatedly deprived of sleep is not being given ideal working conditions for repair and rebuilding.

Prolonged severe stress can also work against recovery. Cortisol is a necessary hormone, not an enemy, but persistently disturbed stress physiology combined with poor sleep, illness and inadequate nutrition is hardly a recipe for maintaining muscles.

No individual ingredient performs a miracle. Strength training, sufficient nourishment and recovery work together.

More Than What the Scale Shows

Strength can decline more rapidly than visible muscle mass.

That is one reason the mirror and the bathroom scale cannot tell us everything. A man may look much the same while gradually losing strength, speed or the capacity to recover after physical effort.

Instead of asking only what the body weighs or how it looks, it is useful to ask what it can do.

Can I still train with reasonable intensity?

Can I lift and carry what I need in my daily life?

Can I take part in the sports, work and hobbies that matter to me?

Can I recover from exertion without needing the rest of the week to feel human again?

And am I maintaining my abilities—or quietly reorganising my life to avoid using them?

These questions apply just as much to a fifty-two-year-old as to a seventy-two-year-old. The answers will be different, but the principle is the same.

Muscles are not only about how we cope when we become old. They influence how fully we can live now and how well prepared we are for what comes later.

Training at Sixty-Seven

I have trained regularly for most of my life.

That has not made me immune to ageing, stiffness or additional kilograms. There is no special veterans’ division in gravity. It continues to apply the same rules throughout our lives.

I used to train more frequently and lift heavier weights than I do today. I now notice clearly that I often need more recovery between demanding sessions.

Accepting that is not the same as giving up.

There is little wisdom in training as though the calendar has made an administrative error. The goal is to apply enough stress to make the body adapt without repeatedly creating injuries that prevent training altogether.

At sixty-seven, consistency is more important to me than proving something during a single workout.

I still enjoy seeing that training produces visible results. There is nothing wrong with being pleased about having a good amount of muscle mass and retaining good strength.

But appearance is not my primary purpose.

I want to move naturally and function well in everyday life—preferably without producing the kind of noises that make everybody nearby wonder whether they should call an ambulance.

I am not training to become twenty-five again.

I am training so that my sixty-seven-year-old body can continue doing what I ask of it.

The Real Question

Young men may continue asking one another how much they can bench. That is fine. Every generation needs its own important questions.

As we grow older, the question changes.

Do I have the strength to continue doing what matters to me?

Can I work, train, travel and remain active?

Am I building a physical reserve—or slowly spending it without making further deposits?

Muscles are not a vanity project that should be handed over exclusively to young men in tight shirts. They are part of our health, capacity, resilience and independence.

You do not need a shirt so tight that it threatens the circulation to benefit from the muscles underneath it.

But you do need to give those muscles a reason to remain active doing their work.