Why YOU Need To Change Your Training as You Age!!!!!!!!!
Lets be honest here for a minute. Most of us bodybuilders, or gym enthusiasts, got into this with the intent of making this a lifestyle and partaking in the gym lifestyle for an extensive amount of time, if not a lifetime. But, one thing that is very hard for some hardcore bodybuilders to accept is the fact that in order to stay in this for the long-haul, a few things may need to change and adapt as we get older. This is the exact point in my journey where I am at and the changes that I am currently making I will share in this post.
Now I will admit here, when we are younger, and by that I mean 30 years old or younger, your body can truly recover from any and everthing you throw at it. I remember times where I would train legs 2 days in a row, put 6 plus plates a side on the hack squat, throw around 200lb dumbbells on a set of single arm rows amongst a number of other shit!! And I was able to recover just fine from all of it, regardless of PED use. Now, I will admit that using PEDs makes things easier in the recovery department, but we cannot deny the fact that the younger age and our ability to recover played a big role in that as well. The goal was go in and hammer the max amount of weight, train to failure and beyond and just fucking GO!!!!!!!!! And guess what, it fucking worked and worked well.
But, what I have slowly noticed as I have gotten into my 30’s is that I now take longer to warmup and feel in the groove and I am usually stiff for the first little bit after waking up in the morning. (things that were not present a few years ago lol). Where I could just jump into leg extensions I now require a few additional light weight warmup sets before I am feeling good. I never had issues with my knees, and I still don't, but I notice now I am a bit stiffer and require a bit more movement and blood flow to get going.
So warmups aside, the next big thing I have changed over the years is focusing more on time under tension and making lighter weights feel harder. I believe when you are a beginner you really just need to focus on lifting hard and heavy, but once you have been at this for quite some time things need to change and that is especially true with your approach to training. Now I am not saying here you can’t go heavy (because God knows I do lol) I am saying that you need to throw in some lighter sets, and throw in some advanced techniques such as slow negatives, static holds or rest pause sets with a lighter work weight. Once you’ve built a decent amount of muscle, it really doesn't take as much as you’d think to hold it so you can and should add some other techniques to allow for additional adaptation while not destroying your body with hard and heavy set after set.
One thing I like to do is perform only 2 big lifts taken to failure, but add in a few additional exercises while throwing in some more advanced techniques. So for example I will hit a few heavy sets of a hack squat, followed by 3-4 high rep working sets on the leg extension, except the reps are performed with a 4 second negative plus a 2 second hold at the top. Now I will be forced to not go as heavy, but does that mean the muscle is not working hard? Fuck no, not in the slightest. I personally feel training like this is much harder than some straight sets, and form me personally I feel I get more out of it while allowing me to recover much better.
So if you are looking to stay in this for the long haul, things need to change if you are to remain injury free. It will only make you better and remember this is a marathon, not a sprint. What good is it if you hammer yourself one day and need to take off the next 2-3? That’s right, its NOT!!! So be smart and train hard!!
BEYOND JUST BODYBUILDING!!!!