subject: Preventing The Development Of Sarcopenia [print this page] There are a variety of diseases that exercise can help treat or even prevent. Sarcopenia is one of these diseases.
As you age, your body tends to begin falling apart. You will probably feel more tired, loose and weak year by year.
With every passing birthday after about age 25, you will begin to lose your muscle mass and integrity year by year. This loss of muscle mass is referred to a sarcopenia.
The word 'sarcopenia' comes from the Greek language and means 'flesh reduction.' As you become weaker, you will be more prone to injury.
Unfortunately, as you age your body will begin to become less effective at healing itself. The more falls and injuries you take, the more your body will struggle in healing itself.
This condition is as serious as osteoporosis and arthritis. Studies have found that people who are inactive tend to lose 0.5% of lean muscle mass every year between the years 25 and 60.
Once someone hits that age of 60, he or she will begin to lose one percent muscle mass as long as he or she remains inactive. At 70, this person will begin to lose two percent muscles mass and every ten years after that the condition will continue to double.
What makes this condition even worse is that you not only lose muscle, but this muscle is often replaced by fat. This is why many inactive older people, who eat fairly well, develop a pouch or larger thighs.
You can often see this occur once a person reaches the age of 30. This condition is most severe in people who do not choose to exercise or to participate in sports.
Even those who are fairly active can still experience a loss in muscle mass, even though it is likely to be less than those who were inactive. The muscles that generally lose the most strength are fast twitch muscles.
Fast twitch muscles are usually used for high intensity anaerobic activities such as weight lifting. Slow twitch muscles usually experience less loss.
These are the muscles that are commonly used for running, dancing, biking and so forth. The severe condition of sarcopenia is not usually found in anyone that is regularly physically active.
While muscle mass is lost beginning at age 25, sarcopenia does not usually develop until around the age of 45. Sarcopenia can result in as much as one percent loss of muscle mass per year.
The loss of muscle mass and strength will affect much more than your ability to exercise. It will hinder your ability to easily do chores, take walks, climb stairs, and so forth.
Simple daily tasks may become difficult. When this happens, the person becomes even more inactive as they try to avoid these tasks.
As a result, the person will become even weaker and even simpler tasks will become more difficult. One of the most effective things that a person can do to combat this condition is to exercise.
However, you must make sure that you work on strengthening all of your muscles. For example, if you are a dedicated biker, you will want to make sure you include some strength training for your arms.
You may want to invest in a small pair of hand weights that you can perform various strengthening exercises with while you pedal with your feet. This will not add any time to your work out, but you will be able to prevent some loss of muscle.
It is also important to make sure you are exercising all of the muscles in your legs. After you are finished with your cardio workout on the bike, you may want to include some weight lifts that will target the muscles in your legs that you do not use while biking.
You should also make sure you include abdominal and back exercises before you begin your bicycle routine. Try to use weight lifts that will work out several different muscles or muscle groups.
This will be the most effective in preventing muscle loss and sarcopenia. Resistance training is very important when it comes to healthy muscles.
In past decades it was assumed that muscle loss was something that could not prevented. However, today studies have proved that exercise can help prevent it.
There are many other things that it is constantly being discovered that exercise can help or improve. Already, the costs of not exercising are severe enough to make not exercising almost an early death sentence.
It is very important that you begin a regular exercise program right away. Exercising can prevent sarcopenia and significantly lengthen your life.
