Full Steam Ahead: How To Approach Strength Training This New Year

The new year can bring new possibilities and new opportunities. Perhaps you’ll travel in unexpected ways or boost your social connections with new relationships. But will you have the physical strength and stamina to keep up? And what happens if the unexpected occurs? That is, should illness or injury short-circuit your exercise and physical activities, will you be prepared and strong enough to bounce back? The older we get, the more time and attention it takes to return to our former selves. This is especially true when it comes to strength. As exercise experts from McMaster University recently reminded us, “Being hospitalized or immobilized for short periods of time can have profound consequences for our muscles. During these short (around five days) and sometimes longer periods of inactivity and immobilization, we lose muscle and get weaker. The bad news is that it’s hard to get that muscle and strength back, particularly as we age.” So what’s your plan for this new year? If you’re already engaging in strength training, that’s great- keep up the momentum and continue to challenge yourself. And if strength training is new for you, don’t fret: You can start small and build up a “muscle reserve” fund for those rainy days when your activity is limited or unachievable. As a reminder of the value and importance of strength training for older adults, grab a dumbbell and look here.

Building a reserve of strength and muscle is essential to maintaining independence and functional day-to-day activities, so that you can continue to move about, carry packages, climb stairs, and attend to whatever you take on to keep your life active and enjoyable. The experts from McMaster make it even easier: Their research shows that even once a week, strength training sessions with light weights can make an important difference. Beyond that insight, a new NPR LifeKit on building strength offers additional basic advice: Don’t make it complicated or get bogged down in the minutiae of an exercise regimen: Consistency is king, and a gradual approach to increasing the weight you use will help build muscle, avoid injury, and keep you motivated to push ahead. And speaking of pushing, the NPR LifeKit gives you a push-up challenge to start you off.

In important ways, successfully developing the motivation to do strength training, whether it be with free weights, resistance bands, gym machines, or even your own body weight, is a matter of setting expectations correctly and intentionally. As a recent NYTimes post on strength training resolutions makes clear, you need to focus on your activities of daily living and what muscles and movements help you power through each day to guide your approach: Concentrate on building muscle to help you squat, push, pull, rotate, hinge, and lunge (all movements you use every day). Among other advice? Track your progress and give yourself recovery time between sessions (48 hours is recommended). And don’t panic if you don’t see much visual progress in your muscles at the start. As the NPR LifeKit makes clear, “Strength isn’t just about the size of your muscles.” 

And to help you begin to build up strength, take a look at several available resources that require no gym membership: First, a recent strength-building 20-minute workout from the New York Times. Or take a look at the valuable strength training sessions available on YouTube from our friends at Yes2Next. Or if you prefer, Silver Sneakers also offers some free strength-training resources and video sessions. And if you’re looking to build your own in-home weight room, consider these recommendations from Very Well Fit, which suggest adjustable weights to allow you to build up your strength and conserve space at the same time. However you do so, the important part is to start. As former professional basketball player Marvin Phillips once said, “The difference between try and triumph is just a little umph!”