Friday, January 2, 2009

Muscle Building After Your 40th Birthday

By Ricardo d Argence

The way that you design your workout routine and how you choose to keep yourself in shape has a lot to do with your age. Some people aged above 40 use age as their excuse for unhealthy lifestyle and to skip workouts

Do not use your age as an excuse to avoid physical fitness. If you approach weight training, diet and work outs the correct way you can maintain a remarkably healthy and fit body for many years, regardless of your age. Routine bodybuilding, along with weightlifting regimens can be used by you to lose weight, reshape your body, become more fit and healthier, and increase your bone density.

Feeling better about yourself starts with keeping physically fit, as it is not a well kept secret that those that take better care of them selves are happy in life. Physical activity also releases endorphins, which induce feelings of happiness in people who exercise.

Let's start with some basics, being over 40 means that you do need to make a few concessions in your workout routine, but it does not mean that you have to be a victim of false notions about aging. As we get older, our muscles and joints are less limber and this means that adequate stretching and warm up prior to exercising is very important.

A 15 minute time allotment that is devoted to necessary stretching and limbering up routines will benefit you by increasing flexibility, and decreasing the chance of muscle or joint sprain or damage. The more completely you stretch the better conditioned your muscles will become.

Now you should do fifteen minutes worth of cardio exercises on an elliptical training machine, a stair stepper or an exercise bike. You are not attempting to reach your limit with this one; however, you do want your heart rate to increase and to continue to develop your limberness and flexibilty. This exercise will let your body know that you are serious about doing some work.

The next step should be to work out with light weights, if you are doing circuit training or a free weight routine, have a quick run through without the stress of heavy weights, and then follow this brief warm up by doing reps with the appropriate weights.

When using the pyramid system, you add reps but use less weight, then you start adding weight and decreasing the reps, which is how a lot of the bodybuilders do their workouts. Pay constant attention to your posture. This method of weightlifting has great success for those who want to add muscle and bulk to their bodies. Even if it means decreasing the weights or the amount of repititions, correct posture must be your main consideration. This maximizes your results and reduces your risk of injury.

Your routine with weights should not last longer than 30-45 minutes each session and you should be training at least 4 days a week. At the end of your weight session, you can again repeat a cardio session as a way to wind down, but to also strengthen your heart and lungs.

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