My paternal grandfather died at 61 from his 2nd heart attack. His first was at 46.
My maternal grandfather died at 73 from a stroke. He had a triple bypass ~10 years earlier.
And my dad had a triple bypass at 56. (Thank God he’s still alive - about to be 79.)
But the mindset of those two generations - The Greatest Generation and the Baby Boomers - is/was that getting old is “just the way it is.”
Which is why I get more info think a lot of guys over 40 today think their best days are behind them (just like their dads and granddads thought).
And you know what?
All of them are right, because the old adage is true:
“As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” - Proverbs 23:7
Which is why many guys over 40 today still suffer in the dullness of their later years…
Quietly withering,
Watching their bodies deteriorate before their very eyes, as if there’s no way to change it…
Que sera, sera - Whatever will be, will be.
That’s just the way it is. (Cue Bruce Hornsby & The Range…)
But not me.
Am I as fit as I was in my early 20s?
Depends on how you assess strength.
Can I hit the same numbers in the Olympic lifts or Powerlifts?
No. I’m probably in the 85-90% range. (And to be honest, I no longer really stress about it .)
But... I can do things like Pistol Squats and One-Arm-One-Leg Push Ups now, and TGU’s with the 48kg, which I couldn’t do back then. (And I'm not in pain all the time, which is its own advantage - quite the opposite of how most guys age.)
And from what I’ve seen firsthand with the guys I’ve been training, it’s totally achievable to hit PRs well into your 40s, 50s, 60s, even beyond.
It all depends on your point of view - what you personally accept .
For example, I got this message from Brett on one of my YouTube videos:
As you can see when he made this remark , he was just close to his 55th birthday.
He reported he’s:
Never felt better
Full of strength
Full of vitality
Improved his VO2Max
And his resting heart rate has decreased by 10 BPM ...
… All in a span of 10 weeks.
As you can see, it quickly leads to see progress - at any age.
All you need is -
1- A plan
2- To consistently stick to that plan
That’s. It.
That’s the “secret” to getting more resilient as you get older.
So, it doesn’t matter your starting point or what you’ve done in the past.
All that matters is that you can find ways to get better from your current baseline.
If you want to follow Brett’s lead, pick up a copy of “The King-Sized Killer”.
Not ready for Snatches?
Use the Clean + Press.
@mjhastings54 said this about ‘THE GIANT’ Clean + Press program -
At the end of the day, we all get to choose what we believe about getting older and how we age.
That choice determines both the quality and the length of the life you’ll live from this day forward.
Me?
I choose strength .
What about you?
Stay Strong,
Geoff Neupert.