Lifting heavy weights three times a week around the age of retirement could dramatically preserve your leg strength long into the later stages of life, research suggests. People naturally lose muscle function as they get older, and experts say faltering leg strength is a strong predictor of death in elderly people. Previous smaller studies have suggested that resistance training, which can involve weights, body weight or resistance bands, might help prevent this happening.
Now researchers led by the University of Copenhagen have found that 12 months of heavy resistance training around retirement age preserves vital leg strength years later. “In well-functioning older adults at retirement age, one year of heavy resistance training may induce long-lasting beneficial effects by preserving muscle function,” the researchers wrote. Their findings were published in the journal BMJ Open Sport and Exercise Medicine.
Researchers studied 451 people around retirement age who were involved in the Live Active Successful Ageing (Lisa) study, a large randomised controlled trial. The participants were randomly split to undergo either one year of heavy resistance training, one year of moderate-intensity training or one year of no extra exercise on top of their usual activity. Those in the weights group lifted heavy weights three times a week.
People in the moderate intensity group did circuits such as body weight exercises and resistance bands three times a week. Each exercise in the heavy.
