Sysdata @Sysdatas

Getting enough protein, pairing it with strength training and fixing low vitamin D are the best supported diet steps for keeping muscle as we age. Losing muscle with age, called sarcopenia, affects somewhere between 6% and 22% of adults over 65 and is a leading driver of disability. Earlier trials have shown that food can help. A 2018 analysis of 49 trials with 1,863 adults found that adding protein to a strength training program built about 5.5 extra pounds of strength on a one-rep lift and about two thirds of a pound of extra lean mass, with no further gain above about 1.6 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight a day. The PROVIDE trial in 380 older adults who already had sarcopenia found that a whey protein drink with vitamin D, taken twice a day for 13 weeks, added a small amount of muscle and made getting up from a chair about 1 second faster than a placebo drink. Those studies tested single approaches. A new review has now ranked the whole range of diet strategies for adults 60 and older. The authors searched studies published from 2010 to April 2026 and included 248, among them 100 randomized trials, covering single nutrients, supplement drinks, whole eating patterns and approaches aimed at the gut. Rather than combining results into one number, they graded how confident we can be in each strategy. 1. Protein of at least 1.0 to 1.2 grams per kilogram of body weight a day, rich in the amino acid leucine and paired with resistance training, had moderate to high certainty, the strongest of any strategy. 2. Correcting vitamin D in older adults whose levels were low also reached moderate to high certainty, with the trials pointing to benefit particularly at doses of at least 800 IU a day. 3. Mediterranean style eating reached moderate certainty, mostly from studies that followed people over time, while probiotics and fiber aimed at the gut and muscle link stayed at low to very low certainty. Taken together, the evidence points toward a simple foundation. For a 70 kg person, about 155 pounds, 1.0 to 1.2 grams per kilogram works out to roughly 70 to 85 grams of protein a day, and that protein does the most good alongside regular strength training. A blood test can show whether vitamin D is running low and worth correcting. The review ranks how confident we can be in each strategy, not how large the benefit is, so it does not say how much muscle any one step will save. The included studies used different definitions of sarcopenia and measured different outcomes, which the authors name as the main barrier to firmer advice. Much of the support for Mediterranean eating comes from observational studies, which show a link rather than proof. References Dharmansyah D et al., Journal of Nutrition, 2026 Morton RW et al., British Journal of Sports Medicine, 2018 Bauer JM et al., Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 2015

What's Your Marathon Cushion? 1️⃣ Start by taking a recent half marathon and see the range the prediction methods give you. My range was 2:55-3:05. Being high-volume, low-mileage, I picked the mid point, 3:00. 2️⃣ Look up what the pace is at that predicted time, and add a little bit (that's Core Pace). 3️⃣ Then do marathon pace sets at Core Pace, capture data, notice how you feel during, and watch what happens afterwards. See my workout notes for how you capture the data. That's a short set - marathons aren't short. 😉 Nordic zones in the picture - use them to assess your cushion. 😃 The closer marathon pace gets to the top of Zone 1 (LT1) the larger the cushion. 😟 The closer marathon pace gets to the top of Zone 3 the smaller the cushion. 🧨 If any of those intervals/sets starts to feel like Zone 4 then fuhgeddaboudit. If you are a low-volume or low-mileage runner then start with the pace implied by the slowest prediction (double half marathon plus 20 minutes or Fetch Everyone). Your profile will best fit those prediction models (see footnotes). More to come on this subject as I prepare to race long in 2027

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WHAT IS ZONE 2? I would like to condense 30 years of work and research in muscle physiology, metabolism, and bioenergetics into how I understand and describe Zone 2 from a bioenergetic perspective. I have explained these concepts many times over the years in podcasts, interviews, lectures and posts, but I have never tried to bring the entire metabolic story together visually. So here it is: 30 years of work and research condensed into five slides, in an AI-produced carousel that I guided scientifically, concept by concept. For me, Zone 2 is not simply a heart rate, power output, pace or lactate number…It is a METABOLIC STATE. It is the intensity at which mitochondrial and bioenergetic demand is the highest, while the cell can still maintain METABOLIC EQUILIBRIUM. And when that equilibrium begins to break, we start moving away from Zone 2 and into what I describe as METABOLIC DRIFT This carousel is my attempt to explain my vision of what Zone 2 represents at the biochemical and bioenergetic level. Identifying where your Zone 2 is can help targeting these cellular and mitochondrial adaptations. #zone2 #metabolicequilibrium #MetabolicDrift

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6 rules for strength training: - Load above 85% of your 1 rep max, 75% if moderately trained - Keep sets at 5 reps or less, intensity is the driver, not volume - Ramp up first: 10 reps at 50%, 8 at 60%, 8 at 70%, 5 at 75% - Then 2 to 3 work sets, 3 sets per exercise is plenty - Rest 2 to 4 min between sets so fatigue doesn't cut your load - Superset another muscle group during that rest, tiny strength cost, far shorter session Strength is a demand for load, not reps. Protect the load and the rest, and the adaptation follows. @DrAndyGalpin on @hubermanlab

New deep dive video: Strength Training for Runners Everything you could ever possibly want to know...and a bit of controversy that will be sure to make some strength folks mad. Let's go: youtube.com/watch?v=e9Gd8-…

Citius, Maius, Melius: Mitochondria & Endurance Performance buff.ly/pLFBdnh In this review, we examine the role of mitochondria in endurance performance

Discipline isn't training hard despite being tired. Discipline is fixing the things that keep making you tired.

My entire philosophy of training 👇 1. Above and beyond performance level/performance goals, first and foremost, movement is medicine. It needs to be taken over the lifespan and is most important in the latter years. If you don't 'take your medicine' regularly, at some point you're going to experience significant pain. As such, our #1 responsibility & first priority, as coaches, should always be to facilitate a healthy, long-term relationship with physical activity & "do no harm". 2. A serious commitment to endurance sports training provides an outlet (and some societal legitimacy) for us, as adults in the modern, 'developed' (non paleolithic) world, to move the amount necessary to preserve health and function over time &, beyond that, the amount that we (as humans) are designed to! 3. As in medicine, when prescribed the right 'dose' at the right time, ALL healthy athletes will get better (though at different rates). As in medicine, when the wrong dose is prescribed, ALL athletes will fail to respond to 'treatment' & eventually get sick. As in medicine, when no organized 'treatment plan' is prescribed, the athlete will progressively deteriorate over time. In other words, plan first and foremost for *consistency* & #TakeYourMedicine 4. It follows that, a large part of 'good coaching' comes down to prescribing the right dose of the right medicine for a given athlete at the right time (In my opinion, not quantifying the dosages that you're prescribing amounts to irresponsible medicine & bad coaching). 5. The 'right dosage' that amounts to an athlete getting better, not sick, overtrained or injured, varies greatly among individual athletes (according to training background, gender, age and genetics) . The 'right dose' is also very strongly related to other (non-training) stressors in their life. Therefore, good coaches (& athletes) monitor non-training stressors & adjust the training accordingly. 6. Athletes who can handle truly competitive 'big doses' tend to be generally 'robust' - strong, supple, muscularly balanced with good general health and constitution, i.e. they lay a foundation of moving well in a variety of ways, at a variety of speeds, with a variety of loads. Even then, big doses can only be sustained for short periods of time and by going out of their way to facilitate recovery (sleep, nutrition etc). This includes actively minimizing/managing other sources of stress, i.e. they eat nutritious foods and live a simple, stable, low-stress life. 7. When it comes to the 'medicine of choice', intensity is no substitute for aerobic volume. The effects don't last and high intensity training has significant negative 'side effects'. If the goal is continued athletic development over the long term, there is simply no substitute for a strong aerobic base.

Ankit 🚩🦅 @1nkyt

3 months ago

@Alan_Couzens For a new follower of yours, do you have a talk, presentation, podcast, blog etc. which summarises your entire philosophy of training?

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Hitting the Wall in Marathon Running: An Integrative Psychophysiological and Durability-Based Review doi.org/10.3390/jfmk11…

What a great idea for a thread! 🧵 Let's come up with a... List of Physical Quests for middle-aged folk who aren't ready for the retirement home just yet! I'll start with some below with some (admittedly arbitrary) ratings of difficulty assuming we're starting from a healthy but untrained middle-age baseline... ⭐️ - Achievable with a few months of focused work for most people. ⭐️⭐️ - Requires meaningful preparation (~6-18 months) ⭐️⭐️⭐️- A serious multi-year project. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Possible for most, but likely requires several years of dedication and commitment. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️- Exceptional; may remain impossible despite excellent preparation. Please add your own suggestions to the list! 🙏 ####### 1/ Run a 10K ⭐️ 2/ Finish a sprint triathlon ⭐️ 3/ Run a sub 2hr half marathon ⭐️⭐️ 4/ Finish a marathon ⭐️⭐️ 5/ Do a century ride ⭐️⭐️ 6/ Summit a non-technical 14er ⭐️⭐️ 7/ Complete the West Highland Way ⭐️⭐️ 8/ Run a sub-4hr marathon ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 9/ Complete a 50k Ultra ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 10/ Finish an Ironman ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 11/ Complete a multi-day 500mi cycling tour ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 12/ Hike the Grand Canyon rim-to-rim in a day ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 13/ Perform 10 strict pull-ups ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 14/ Complete the Tour du Mont Blanc ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 15/ Complete a 10K Open Water Swim ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 16/ Summit Kilimanjaro ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 17/ Hit a 50ml/kg/min VO2max at 50+ ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 18/ Qualify for the Boston Marathon ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 19/ Complete a 100mi Ultra ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 20/ Qualify for Kona ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 21/ Thru-Hike the Colorado Trail ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 22/ Paddle the Inside Passage ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 23/ Deadlift 2x Bodyweight ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 24/ Summit Aconcagua ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 25/ Swim the English Channel ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 26/ Win age-group in Kona ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 27/ Climb Mt. Everest ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 28/ Thru-hike Continental Divide Trail ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 29/ Paddle the Aleutian chain ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 30/ Complete solo RAAM⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ######## So, my grey-haired adventurer, which quest will it be? 👴🛡️⚔️

dani dewitt @danidewitt

3 months ago

@feelthebyrn1 @Alan_Couzens Trying to build a long list of appropriate quests for older family members that haven't previously been athletes (or active enough). Good recommendations?

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3 things to triangulate when setting your base training heart rate cap... 1/ Lactate 🩸 (before first rise) 2/ Fat Burning 🔥 (minimal CHO contribution) 3/ Heart Rate 🫀(at or slightly beyond first rise) Regarding the latter, more from Ch 6 of my book 👇 alancouzens.substack.com/p/chapter-6-ev… Note: For intermediate-advanced athletes, considering lactate alone isn't enough!

1t4ly l0v @1taly_l0v

3 months ago

@Alan_Couzens My LT1 is 145 bpm (185 max). I feel pretty easy at it. Seems like my muscles are more developed than my heart. What’s my hr cap for the heart development?

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The answer to the question - "How easy should easy runs be?" - can be found in another question... What is an "easy run"? 👇 All training sessions can be broadly classified into 2 categories... 1. Hard (lots of benefit, high cost) 2. Easy (some benefit, minimal cost) "Cost" here encompasses a few things, but the big one is glycogen. Easy runs don't cost very much glycogen (so they allow you to keep recovering glycogen between the harder runs) *but* they still offer cardiovascular and (especially) metabolic benefit. Very low/no cost + Some benefit = Good deal! 💰 Now, the big benefit to easy runs is, the more of them you do, the lower their relative cost becomes! That is, you use less and less glycogen as your fat burning improves 🔥 This is the whole concept of building the base. However, if all of your runs are hard (glycogen-dependent) runs, your fat-burning will never improve! Therefore, truly "easy" intensity begins with where you currently burn a good amount of fat. This can be hinted at by lactate, but is best assessed via a metabolic test 🥼 The results can be humbling! Even for relatively fit folks, this could be a walk! 🚶 But, only by going truly eazzzzy do we expand our range of what easy is and how much of it we can do. So, when it comes to the intensity of your easy runs, when in doubt...

What's that smell? Your "glucose sink" is clogged! 🪠 Having muscle isn't enough. You have to use it! There's a popular line going around at the moment that more muscle = more metabolic health because it serves as a "glucose sink" to help keep blood glucose levels in check. This isn't true... unless you use it! For glucose to be taken up from the bloodstream, energy must be used or stored. In terms of use - glucose utilization depends on active muscle, not passive muscle. At rest, the increased metabolic need of muscle is a lot less than what most people think. ~65 kcal/d per 5kg of muscle... That's a whole lot of muscle for not much increased energy use! Now, if that extra 5kg of muscle is highly oxidative muscle - that adds an extra 750ml to the person's VO2max - and they *use* that extra muscle to generate an extra 25W on their 2hr bike every day, then we're talking about an extra 200kcal/d. Now we're talking! In terms of storage - glucose storage also scales with use of muscle, not size of muscle. The stimulus for increased glycogen storage within the muscle is - you guessed it - glycogen depletion from extended movement. (Endurance) Athletes can store more than twice the amount of glycogen as non-athletes in the same amount of muscle! So, in order for your muscles to be able to accommodate & store large amounts of glucose, it's far more about having endurance-trained muscles rather than big muscles. ##### Bottom line... If you want to keep your glucose sink working as it should, it's not about having a bigger sink, it's about cleaning your pipes. How do you keep your pipes clean? Move, my friends. Move! 🚶

THE ANSWER: D) You breathe it out. If you guessed A, don't feel bad. A famous 2014 study published in the British Medical Journal showed that 98% of doctors, dietitians and personal trainers get this exact question wrong! Most people think fat is burned into pure energy or heat. But human bodies aren't nuclear reactors. According to the Law of Conservation of Mass, the physical weight of that fat has to physically go somewhere. Energy has no mass! Human fat is stored as triglycerides, which are made of Carbon, Hydrogen, and Oxygen. When you are in a calorie deficit and your body breaks down that fat for fuel, it undergoes oxidation. The fat molecule is literally split apart and converted into two things: 1️⃣ Carbon Dioxide 2️⃣ Water The breakdown math is incredibly precise. To lose 10 kg of human fat: • 8.4 kg turns into Carbon Dioxide. This is carried by your blood to your lungs, where you literally exhale the physical weight out into the air. • 1.6 kg turns into Water. This mixes into your circulation and is excreted out via urine, sweat and breath vapor. Yes, you read that correctly. 84% of your lost fat is exhaled as an invisible gas. Your lungs are the primary excretory organ for weight loss! FOLLOW ME for more such posts!

Millions of people go to the gym every day to burn fat and lose weight. ​But if you lose 10 kg of fat, where does that mass actually go? ​(99% of you will definitely get it wrong) ​A) It turns into pure energy B) You sweat it out C) You excrete it D) You breathe it out How?

This is your muscle at 25 vs. 55. On the left: dense, healthy tissue. On the right: muscle marbled with fat like a ribeye steak. It's called myosteatosis, and if you're not lifting heavy and you're carrying extra fat, it's already happening to you.

@TejasTekk Done 👍 Ordered. Thanks

This message is brought to you by Big Walk™️ 😊 cc @gregmushen @CoffeeBlackMD

Alan Couzens @Alan_Couzens

4 months ago

Your metabolic health is largely determined by your ability to burn fat 🔥 Think of it as your "triglyceride threshold." The more *metabolically* fit you become, the higher the intensity at which your muscles can continuously clear and oxidize circulating triglycerides. And,

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As an orthopedic surgeon, I see more people for tendon pain than for any other single problem. Most of them have been given the same advice, and most of that advice is quietly keeping them stuck. A few things I wish every patient understood about tendons...