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Muscle-strengthening activities — like weight lifting — should be part of an older person’s weekly exercise routine, according to a new study.
American researchers found that people who did both aerobic exercise and strength training were more likely to live longer than those who did only one or the other.
But you don’t have to go to the gym: you can also carry heavy shopping bags, dig in the garden and do pilates.
Both types of activity are indicated according to current recommendations.
The NHS, the UK’s public healthcare system, advises adults over 65 to be physically active every day and to engage in activities to improve strength, balance and flexibility at least twice per week.
She also recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity per week, or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity activity if you’re already active.
The importance of muscle
It is known that a steady increase in heart rate makes people healthier and healthier, and helps to prolong their life.
But little is known about the effects of weightlifting or muscle-strengthening exercises on life expectancy.
The US study, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, asked more than 150,000 people in their 60s and 70s about their exercise habits and then tracked them.
Researchers found that participants who got the recommended 150 minutes of moderate exercise per week lived longer than those who didn’t, but those who combined regular aerobic exercise with muscle-strengthening activities once or twice times a week fared even better.
They were 47% less likely to die from any cause, except cancer, over the next nine years, compared to people who were not active.
Weightlifting alone reduced the risk by 9-22%, and aerobic exercise alone by 24-34%.
Brisk walking, running, cycling and swimming are examples of aerobic exercise, which work the heart and lungs.
The study also found that women benefited more from weightlifting than men.
The research team, from the National Cancer Institute in Maryland and the University of Iowa, both in the United States, explained that muscle-strengthening exercises can make the body leaner and the bones stronger, which which leads to a healthier life in old age.
“Our finding that mortality risk appears to be lower in people who performed both types of exercise lends strong support to current recommendations to engage in aerobic and muscle-strengthening activities,” said author Jessica Gorzelitz. of the study.
“Older adults would likely benefit from adding weightlifting exercises to their physical activity routine.”
The study only looked at free weights, but the researchers say other types of exercise are also applicable, such as squats, squats and pilates.
According to the NHS, muscle-strengthening activities can include:
- Carry heavy bags of groceries;
-
Yoga ;
-
The pilates
- The tai chi;
- Weightlifting
- Exercises with resistance bands
- Do exercises that use your body weight, such as push-ups and sit-ups;
- Heavy gardening.
The study, while important, was observational and could not prove that it was weightlifting that made people live longer.
It also depended on the participants’ ability to remember at any time how much exercise they had done in the previous year.
The researchers, however, tried to eliminate other factors that might have influenced the result, such as education, race and ethnicity, but they got the same result.