I have been endurance training for most of my adult life. In fact, I recently wrote a short story on Substack based on my college days, https://tomstratman.substack.com/p/the-river?r=3s5xzoThere are three major biomarkers in endurance training: VO2max, lactate threshold, and exercise economy (efficiency). For the over 50 casual athlete, VO2max after 50 is the most difficult of…
Vegetable Review of the Month-October Beets for endurance athletes are one of the few foods with a real physiological mechanism behind their reputation, and that mechanism matters more, not less, after 50. The reason is nitrate, a compound beets carry in unusually high amounts, which your body converts into nitric oxide, a molecule that relaxes…
Why Tendons and Ligaments Are a Collagen Story Tendons and ligaments are, structurally, collagen tissue. Type I collagen makes up roughly 60 to 80 percent of the dry weight of a healthy tendon or ligament, organized into densely packed fibrils that give these tissues their tensile strength (Taye et al., 2020; Screen et al., 2015)….
Ask a dedicated cyclist why they started running, or an amateur runner why they picked up a bike, and you tend to hear the same story: something plateaued, or something broke, and the other sport turned out to be exactly what filled the gap. That is not coincidence. Running and cycling load the aerobic engine…
What is DNA? DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is the molecule that carries the genetic instructions for building and operating every living organism. It is shaped like a twisted ladder, known as a double helix, made up of two long strands wound around each other. The rungs of that ladder are pairs of four chemical bases:…
I work out 8-10 hours per week. It’s a combination of indoor cycling (which I teach at the YMCA) and my Fit for Life classes 4 times/week @ 50 minutes/class. I am a strength & conditioning coach for an alcohol & drug recovery entity. And I strength train a minimum of 3 times per…
If you’ve strained or torn a muscle — an erector spinae strain, a hamstring pull, a rotator cuff tweak — you’ve probably been told to “get your protein in” for recovery. That advice isn’t wrong, but it’s incomplete. The research on tissue repair points to something more specific: essential amino acids (EAAs), and one in…
You’re Doing the Work. So Why Is Muscle Still Slipping Away? L-Leucine for Active Adults Over 50: What the Science Says You’re not sitting on the couch. You’re showing up for your workouts, watching your protein intake, and taking your health seriously. Yet somewhere in your fifties or sixties, you noticed something frustrating: maintaining muscle…
If you want to know how to boost metabolism after 50, most of what mainstream wellness culture recommends gets it wrong. Cut calories. Do more cardio. Eat less. That framework misidentifies the problem entirely. Metabolism after 50 slows not because you are eating too much, but because you have lost the tissue that burns energy….
In Part One we covered what metabolism is, how the mitochondria burn fuel, and what sarcopenia does to your muscle over time. All of that is the physiology. But if you’ve been paying attention to your own body through your 50s, you’ve probably noticed something the charts don’t fully capture: it doesn’t just feel slower….
