In Dr. Peter Attia’s book, Outlive, he rates strength training as the number one thing we can do to improve our health span.
People often think life span but what’s living if we aren’t healthy enough to experience a full life! Health span is about living a fully functional life with little or no disease.
How does this relate to bone density?
Bones are vital to keeping us functionally strong, but they can weaken over time. The best way to maintain healthy bone density is to add load to the body. Not just any load but a significant amount to elicit the desired adaptation of increased bone density. We must lift heavy things and do it often!
Let’s break down what this really means. Simply put, it means we have to train!
It’s vital to condition our bodies to be prepared to lift and move heavy weights.
It’s also important to have the mindset that you will perform heavy strength training for life if bone density is a concern.
The great thing is, if you are training for increased bone density you are also getting strong and maintaining muscle mass which is equally important. The secret is to adopt training as part of our life and part of defining who you are. We coach clients to ingrain this type of quality self-talk as a mindset anchor.
Living intentionally is powerful and when striving to evolve into your best self, adding tension can help to facilitate change.
IN-TENTION or we could interpret the word as IN-TENSION. Either way, it’s helps us get the desired response.
Here are NIMBLE’S top three bone density objectives.
- Condition a client’s body for motor control and stability.
- Condition a client’s ligaments and tendons for heavy load.
- Strength train at 80% of their max lifting weight to get the desired adaption of increased bone density.
The awesome thing here is by checking these boxes you are laying a solid foundation for a long list of other adaptations that will help increase your LIFE-HEALTH SPAN.
Namaste,
Daniel
