Exercise is good for you. It makes you feel healthier, more flexible, and stronger. It can help your coordination and make it easier to perform physical tasks. It can ease the pain and swelling of arthritis. But studies are now showing that resistance training can help rejuvenate muscle tissue in senior citizens!
A study from McMaster University Medical Center in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada looked at the decline in mitochondria function in older adults. The mitochondria are known as the powerhouse of the cell, and its dysfunction leads to loss of muscle mass and general impairment of function.
Muscle tissue samples from a group of healthy adults over the age of seventy were compared to muscle tissue samples from healthy younger adults (in their twenties). Half the older adults spent six months being relatively active — golfing, walking, gardening, and other moderate exercise three or more times per week. They were also asked to do resistance training twice a week. The younger adults were non-athletes who participated in occasional moderate exercise.
For the older adults who exercised and did resistance training, the results were dramatic. The muscle tissue of the older adults started to look more like the tissue from the younger adults. Before the study, the older adults were 59% weaker than the younger adults. After the study, the older adults were only 38% weaker than the younger adults. The doctors involved with the study weren’t expecting results like this. They didn’t think the genetic samples would change so greatly; instead, they expected that the “genetic fingerprint” would stay much the same.
In a follow-up four months after the study ended, researchers found the older adults still working out — not at the gym, but with elastic bands or even lifting soup cans.
The bottom line? Exercise isn’t just good for your health but it can actually reverse the aging process. You don’t have to spend your life working out to reap the benefits, and it’s never too late to start exercising.