As a senior citizen looking to maintain a healthy lifestyle, you would be well served by incorporating a strength training component in your normal exercise routine. In addition to helping preserve your muscle mass, strength and bone density as you age, strength training will also lead to an increase in your overall daily metabolic rate and can help you control weight gain.
Metabolic Rate as You Age
Life requires a complex series of chemical reactions that allow nutrient molecules ingested in the foods you eat to be broken down to release energy and to allow your body to build the new molecules that are required for the maintenance, growth and repair of your body's tissues and organs. These chemical reactions are collectively known as metabolism, and that rate at which they occur is referred to as your metabolic rate. One of the many changes that occur in your body as you age is the gradual but continual decline in your resting metabolic rate.
Contributors to Metabolic Rate
Your daily metabolic rate is calculated from your basal metabolic rate, the metabolic rate required to just maintain life, plus the total metabolic activity required to support your daily activities. This latter category includes the metabolic energy required for simple daily activities such as dressing and walking, along with any exercise that you engage in. As you age, your basal metabolic rate and therefore your total daily metabolic rate will slowly, but continually, decline.
Metabolic Rate Following Strength Training
It should be apparent that the muscle contractions required during strength-training exercise consume additional metabolic energy and add to your total daily metabolic rate. What is less apparent is the fact that following the conclusion of your strength-training exercise, your metabolic rate will remain elevated for up to 39 hours as your muscles use additional metabolic energy to recover, synthesize new protein and grow. This can be helpful in contributing to a higher daily metabolic rate for seniors.
Metabolic Rate and Muscle Mass
Muscle is a metabolically active tissue and burns many more calories per day than do equal weights of fat, bone and connective tissues. As the percentage of muscle mass in your body increases as the result of a regular program of strength training, your daily resting metabolic rate will increase as well. This is particularly important for seniors. Because of declining levels of certain hormones, you tend to lose muscle mass as you age.
References
- Journal of Gerontology; Aging, Resting Metabolic Rate, and Oxidative Damage: Results From the Louisiana Healthy Aging Study; Madlyn I. Frisard et. al.
- European Journal of Applied Physiology; Effect of An Acute Period of Resistance Exercise on Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption; Mark D. Shuempke et. al
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Growing Stronger - Strength Training for Older Adults
- Journal of Musckuloskeletal Neuron Interaction; Age-Related Loss of Skeletal Muscle Function; G. Goldspink
- Journal of Nutrition; Changing Perspectives on Aging and Energy Requirements: Aging, Body Weight and Body Composition in Humans, Dogs and Cats; E. Jean Harper
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