What does getting old "feel" like?

The down-side of running when you're older:

- You'll never touch your HS/college times again.

- You make old-man sounds getting out of bed, off the couch, etc.

- Mystery pains and, in my case, stress fractures.

The up-side:

- In other sports - soccer, basketball - you run circles around other guys.

- A PR at any distance, even coming close, feels better with age.

- If you want to run, run. If you'd rather kick back, throw a few steaks on the grill, nobody's stopping you.

40 is the new 30 wrote:

The down-side of running when you're older:

- You'll never touch your HS/college times again.

- You make old-man sounds getting out of bed, off the couch, etc.

- Mystery pains and, in my case, stress fractures.

The up-side:

- In other sports - soccer, basketball - you run circles around other guys.

- A PR at any distance, even coming close, feels better with age.

- If you want to run, run. If you'd rather kick back, throw a few steaks on the grill, nobody's stopping you.

I agree with many that recovery takes much longer as you get older. That's been very noticeable. But, I also agree with this post that says relative to my peers, I am very fit - and it is abundantly clear playing other sports against other people my age. Watch an over-40s soccer game. If you have speed, you are like Pele in those leagues.

Age 53

Recovery from a workout and an injury takes longer.

I lose fitness faster.

For training, consistency trumps heroism.

Do the workout I can recover from, not the workout I can do.

Do least one workout per week at high intensity.

Top end speed (50, 100) goes first.

I can't handle running in the heat as well.

I run as much as possible on soft surfaces (grass, trails).

Stay active.

Weights are necessary. I do low reps, high intensity and get good results, e.g., 1.5x body weight for bench press

One-legged aka Bulgarian squats are magic for me.

I keep yearly age PRs to keep me motivated and encouraged.

I'm a week from turning 47, and have been running since age 30, although quite hard from the start - when I started running I discovered I was better than average so I became quite addicted to it and with 18 months of taking it up (after quitting almost 17 years of smoking) I was running low-17's and sub-1:20 HMs. It was fun, and I would argue that from age 31 - early 40s I was healthier and more fit than at any time in my life. It felt so, anyway.

I first noticed age-related issues (running-related as well as just normal aging stuff) after 45 or so. I stopped being able to sleep more than 7-8 hours when I have the option to sleep for longer. I took longer to recover from hard/long runs. Depression, which I have had problems with my whole life, became more prominent.

Another thing I don't believe anyone has touched on regarding what it feels like to get older is how you are viewed by younger people. Suddenly you are out-of-touch and deemed kind of clueless by the younger set, kind of like how we all viewed our parents when we were children and teenagers.

Also, having a longer period of being alive, older people have memories of a world that was very different, which I think is one of the biggest differences. I fully remember a world without the internet or personal computers having any real meaning. My family got an Apple IIe in the early 80's and realized there wasn't a real use for it - people sort of bought them as a status symbol, not something they would actually use. I remember taking computer classes in high school on a Commodore VIC-20, and then a PET. We learned BASIC.

I think that once you reach a certain age you also start recognizing repeating patterns in music, fashion, and lots of other things. You start to see the cyclical nature.

brofest2015 wrote:

fat old guy wrote:

If you're one of those young guys who has to work really hard to gain weight, there will come a day when it becomes really hard NOT to gain weight, and even harder to lose it once gained.

When bro? Need a date

No one knows. Differs from person to person.

Tart Red Cherry, the brand I drink from Trader Joe's is 100% pure. At least, that's what the label says.

I am 58.5 today...have to work harder every year to run sub 7 minute miles for anything more than a 5k....cross train and enjoy the ride..

Enjoy what you have while you have it and make every effort to lose as little as possible as slowly as possible. Getting old "feels" slow but suddenly arrives quickly.

26-31 was the best for me, especially in the 10k and 1/2 marathon (not for races less than 5k though, I'll admit, but I did carve out out a 4:21 mile road race at 30)i felt aerobically strong, not too sore, patient and confident in workouts and races in that time framethen things started to go downhill very very slowly, until i realized i wouldn't be PRing any more. tighter. more sore. more recovery. had to work harder to access the speed i hadlife gets better in general as you get older though...but i'm only 39

gettingolder wrote:

This is a legitimate question and one I'm surprised more young guys don't ask.

I'm in my 20s, but I've always wondered how I'll feel in every day life and in running when I'm in my 30s, 40s, and 50s. So I'll pose the question to those of you who are in those age ranges - what does getting older "feel" like? Do you notice your energy levels dropping? Does running become that much harder? Do you really require less sleep?

I'm 50 and all I can say is "Getting old ain't for sissies"

For the record, I'm 55 now.

Lot's of good stuff above and I agree with the common threads...

- Injuries happen more easily and take longer to get over.

- Harder to keep weight under control.

- Feel like an old cripple at the beginning of almost every run, but get warmed up within a few minutes and everything feels fine.

- I started to notice the injury / recovery impacts in my late 30s.

The things that stand out most for me personally are...

- Almost every morning when I get out of bed (especially after a hard run the day before) I'm so stiff that I start thinking "I'm going to have to take today off. No way I can run with my legs/back/feet feeling like this." Then, after I've been up and around for awhile, I usually feel OK and am looking forward to my run.

- On faster (tempo/race) days, I feel like I'm running just as fast as I ever did. My posture and turnover feel good. I can get into a good rhythm and can push myself when it gets hard. But, as others have stated, the clock does not agree with my perception.

- From age 51 to 53, my training and racing were going very well. I was averaging over 60 mpw for much of that time and handling it OK. Then I got bad PF in both feet and last year was an on again off again struggle. My yearly mileage was less than half the previous year and I gained a bunch of weight. I've been pretty consistently rebuilding since early this year. I've dropped about half the weight I gained and seem to have plateaued. I've been averaging low 50s mpw for the past few months and just can't seem to push any higher. I haven't raced much, but my times are way off where I was 2 years ago, despite feeling like my training is going pretty well.

- Even though lifetime PRs are ancient history, I find that during periods where my fitness is good, my Age Graded times are still pretty much in line with my PRs from my late 20s and early 30s. So, it seems that my decline is pretty much "normal".

Dadfan wrote:

Tart Red Cherry, the brand I drink from Trader Joe's is 100% pure. At least, that's what the label says.

I take Tart Cherry Extract... the Life Extension brand. One of my older running friends recommended it for aches and pains. It does work really well.

Has anyone mentioned the ever decreasing heart rate ceiling?

Other than the recovery and injuries that might be the most prominent thing that is noticeable. Most simply can't sustain a high heart rate for very long. As a younger runner you can go 180s - 190s for quite a ways, but in your 50s is 150s for most of us. Get into the mid 160s and running gets very tough very quickly. I'm sure there is some variablility here, but that's been my observation.

The common theme through all these responses is the physical limitations of aging....BUT... it seems that almost all of you state that you are enjoying life more than ever. Which makes me feel hopeful, even though I hate the thought of aging (I'm 26). Is it financial security? Emotional satisfaction? Family? Overall maturity?

It's getting harder wrote:

- On faster (tempo/race) days, I feel like I'm running just as fast as I ever did. My posture and turnover feel good. I can get into a good rhythm and can push myself when it gets hard. But, as others have stated, the clock does not agree with my perception.

.

53 and counting...

Agree with this and what everyone else has said, especially the mile or two you feel like your a 100 year old man while warming up.

There's been a big fall-off in top speed which translates to all distances. My endurance is still OK..

But there are 2 big advantages of being an aging runner.

1. Don't need viagra.

2. I catch myself on long runs, especially this time of year on a back road, and truly feel happy to be able to run at a decent clip for 2 hours. I never appreciated that when I was younger.

yet another wrote:

Has anyone mentioned the ever decreasing heart rate ceiling?

Other than the recovery and injuries that might be the most prominent thing that is noticeable. Most simply can't sustain a high heart rate for very long. As a younger runner you can go 180s - 190s for quite a ways, but in your 50s is 150s for most of us. Get into the mid 160s and running gets very tough very quickly. I'm sure there is some variablility here, but that's been my observation.

So True for me .

Also had two cardiac ablations which didn't help .

HR in 160s and I'm running slower than when I started at 9 years of age .

The drop off was sudden . Could run 34 minute for 5miles 7 years ago.

Cant break 7 for a mile now .

54 years old now .

Imagine you are drowning.................then someone hands you a baby..............................that's it

It's an uphill battle... even when it's a downhill run.

younger person wrote:

The common theme through all these responses is the physical limitations of aging....BUT... it seems that almost all of you state that you are enjoying life more than ever. Which makes me feel hopeful, even though I hate the thought of aging (I'm 26). Is it financial security? Emotional satisfaction? Family? Overall maturity?

Yes to each of these. I feel much more stable and settled with much less angst. While running is slower and more limited, it's more enjoyable because I'm not slavishly chained to a training and racing schedule, and I no longer tie my self worth to my most recent race results.