Ep 10. Fitness in your 30-40’s: how to get the most out of your body

Voiceover (00:02):

Welcome to The Confident Body, where experienced health professionals discuss how to get the most out of your body for the lifestyle you choose. We believe everyone can exercise and get the most out of life, regardless of your injuries or health issues. Now, here’s your host, senior physiotherapist, Michael Dermansky

Michael Dermansky (00:23):

Hi everyone, and welcome to the show that helps you become more confident in your body, so you can keep doing the things you love. I’m Michael Dermansky, senior physiotherapist at MD Health. Today, I’ve got a special guest, David Smith from Absolute Health & Performance. Welcome to the show, David.

David Smith (00:37):

Thanks for having me, Michael. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Michael Dermansky (00:39):

Fantastic. Well, he’s an exercise scientist, but I’ll get him to introduce himself a little bit more on who he is and what he does, and then we’ll get started into the show.

David Smith (00:47):

Of course. Briefly, I’m an exercise scientist and strength conditioning coach. Been working primarily in private practice, but I’ve spent some time in elite sport and been doing it for about 20 years. I’m the co-founder and director of Absolute Health and Performance, as Michael said, sports medicine center, which we have two locations in the city and one located in Armidale and we have a multidisciplinary center. So, like where Michael’s at, we have physios and we also have osteos, soft tissue therapy, range of different performing coaches, and of course, and sports doctors as well. So, sort of a one-stop shop for all your health needs is what we aim to bring to the table.

Michael Dermansky (01:20):

Fantastic. Excellent. We’ve got a very specific topic today. We’re talking about fitness in your thirties and forties, how to get the most from your body. The first thing I’m going to ask today is what do you think are the most important elements of an exercise program in your thirties and forties?

David Smith (01:34):

Yeah, I think before we start with what’s important, I think it’s also important that we address the actual why it’s important. Now, it’s critical for physical, mental, sexual, and professional health for anyone in their thirties and forties and for all ages to sort of stay physically active. But the reason I mention four different categories as opposed to just getting fitter or reducing fat levels or increasing muscles is I think the other sections are the things that become more important in our thirties and forties.

David Smith (02:00):

Most of us at this age, I’m 40 myself, are not meeting the minimums of the recommendations. The work-from-home environment that just really come through COVID has sort of taken away a lot of the incidental stuff. And this is the ages where those risk profiles for our chronic disease states really start to kick in and kind of set the tone for the next 50 to 60 years, hopefully, of what our health looks like. It’s why you start to have your cervical screenings more frequently. It’s where prostate checks start coming into place.

David Smith (02:27):

So, it’s a really important stage of life that we are including physical activity. Because as I said, it does set the stone, but it’s probably one of the hardest periods. And we’ll probably talk about that a little bit more with the barriers.

David Smith (02:38):

What are the most important elements? I’m sure you’ve heard it on this podcast before. I know I’ve listened to it. Strength training. 55% of people of all ages, especially in our thirties and forties, are meeting the aerobic guidelines, but unfortunately, only 15% meeting the strength training guidelines. It’s unequivocal, the best form of training. Obviously, I’m biased. I love my strength training. It’s what I do each day, but also the evidence does support it. I consider it as your main meal. Every other type of physical activity is just your sides and your starters.

David Smith (03:06):

Obviously, time becomes an issue. So, learning how to be efficient with your training becomes more important. Learning to have a Plan B. People assign themselves to one mode or one type of exercise. “I’m a yoga person, I’m a runner, I’m a cyclist, I’m a gym person.” And then when life happens, it becomes throw the baby out with the bath water. Becomes a bit of an all or none. Thankfully, it’s at an age where a lot of people, we start to have a little bit more work autonomy so we can be starting to shape our environment that’s more helpful for us to achieve physical activity guidelines.

David Smith (03:38):

But it’s certainly the age, as I said, that we start investing and I use the term, health super, where obviously all, most at this age starting to really think about working towards the next 20, 30 years. What does retirement look like and investing in our superannuation. I think it’s the time that we start investing in our health super and also start to reframe our reasons why we want to stay physically active outside of the superficial things that might have got us through and got those motivators occurring when we’re in our teens and in our twenties.

Michael Dermansky (04:07):

It is a very traditional stage, isn’t it? Where you do question, “Okay, well, I don’t want to just do this because I want five-minute abs. I want to do this because I want to feel strong. I want to feel healthier as well.”

Michael Dermansky (04:17):

I can’t agree with you more in terms of the strength training as well. I mean, that’s where we often start in our center as well because that’s where people are lacking and that’s the biggest reason why they can’t do what they want to do.

David Smith (04:30):

Yeah. It’s certainly a barrier. Whatever the type of activity you’re passionate about, those underlying strength capacities become very important and it doesn’t need to be for everyone. And strength can be defined in so many ways, but some form of stimulus that’s put through the musculoskeletal system a couple times a week that’s getting you close to evolutional fatigue, that’s what you need to do. And for some, that’s a barbell. For some, that’s squatting with your kids at home. For some, that’s some pushups and lunges in the office. It can be quite variable.

Michael Dermansky (04:57):

Fantastic. What are the risks of not? What are the benefits of doing so?

David Smith (05:04):

Yeah, so I think I sort of touched on it is we continue to try to align it with motivation, which is a finite resource with superficial outcomes, like we were younger, and that doesn’t necessarily then start to match up with where our priority shifts and our identity shifts occur at later in life.

David Smith (05:21):

A big barrier is we don’t invest in our health. Most people now have got a regular accountant. They’ve probably got a regular GP. They might have a regular lawyer for whatever reasons they would use that for. But it’s all not very common that people are investing in seeing a regular personal trainer, a regular exercise physiologist, exercise scientist, physio, and I actually just say, my dad always used to tell me that, “If you can’t afford to have insurance, you can’t afford not to.” Now, of course, there is a cost involved in seeing an expert and seeing someone that can help guide you and get you started in your physical activity pursuits and strength training hopefully is a big part of that, but we should be not viewing it as a cost, but it is an investment.

David Smith (06:03):

I spoke about the minimums, that we’re trying to get people to be active at least twice a week with strength training and some form of cardiovascular training or movement most days of the week, but people that grew up in the ’90s, in the ’90s era of physical activity, were really exposed to the no-pain, no-gain analogy. So coming with that comes the all-or-none approach. Whereas I think we also need to understand that even 10 minutes have some amazing benefits for our mental health side of things. It has a good starting point for strength training, a good starting point for our cardiovascular health.

David Smith (06:38):

Ultimately, I think where people go wrong, as I said, it’s the lining things up with our priorities. Our shifts mean in life and everything that happens means we may put more priority, more value on dependents, on our children, on our work environments, our professional world. It’s a bit of a backwards approach because of course, by not investing in ourselves, we’re actually detrimental to those now more important areas of our life.

David Smith (07:02):

One thing that I’ve also seen that happens at thirties and forties is that we start to have the justification in self-talk that it’s okay to feeling that little bit sorer, to get out of bed, it feels a little bit harder. It’s okay to put on that little bit of extra adipose tissue and be feeling with those aches and pains because, “Hey, it’s just a part of getting older.” So, we’re putting on unnecessary barriers that are not actually real.

Michael Dermansky (07:27):

Yeah. [inaudible 00:07:29].

David Smith (07:28):

Internal self-talk is a big part of it, I think too.

Michael Dermansky (07:32):

I mean, you talk about where people go wrong as well. Are any other things that you’ve noticed that where people go wrong when they say, “Oh, I’m going to start to get fit again now too.” What have you noticed?

David Smith (07:44)

Yeah, I guess, as I said, the time priorities. The assumptions that it needs to be… We know we need to be getting a large amount per week for the health guidelines, but people think they need to go from zero to a million miles an hour. So, that’s certainly a large challenge.

David Smith (07:58):

The self-talk, as I mentioned. The value shifts. But I think the largest thing that we can improve the physical activity, us as practitioners, helping out our clients and for clients themselves is to start thinking about physical activity and how it might improve their lives. I’ve spoken earlier about the chronic disease risks and things that start happening at this life, but that’s sort of the stick approach. We want to be looking at towards goals. So, if people can start to understand how regular physical activity in their thirties and forties start to align better to their new values and their identities, then that will take you a long way into finding consistency with your training.

Michael Dermansky (08:38):

I mean, consistency is the biggest key. We find that too. The word consistency is… There’s two things, strength training and consistency are the two really big ones that have come out this year. One of the great things about 2022, as opposed to 2021, 2020, is that we have had the ability to have consistency with people’s training. We’re starting to see the outcomes we should have been seeing in the last two years because exercise have been so broken up the last couple of years, they’ve lost that faith in the exercise that will actually make a difference. But now we’ve had the ability to be consistent, it’s a pretty big thing, because you’re actually starting to see the results you should be seeing from physical activity where it’s changing people’s lives. Their lives is better for it.

David Smith (09:20):

Yeah. It’s definitely been a bumpy road to be able to maintain. This is where that Plan B became important, particularly over the last couple of years. If you identified as a gym person but suddenly you weren’t able to attend your gym, your trainer, your environment, that it all came to a grinding halt. Hopefully, we don’t go through those COVID periods again, but establishing a Plan B and understanding other options to keep yourself physically active becomes very important.

Michael Dermansky (09:48):

I mean, as you said, people, a lot of people try to go from zero to the guidelines in one go and there’s issues with that too. We had an interesting chat when we did the interview with Andrew Wild. He said, “It doesn’t matter if this is the ideal. But what will you consistently do? If you can do one day a week consistently, if you can do two days a week consistently, that’s a better outcome than the perfect program.” What are your thoughts about that?

David Smith (10:11):

Yeah. A little done a lot is much better than a lot done a little. As I said, that all-or-none approach of the ’90s no pain, no gain that’s strong in this thirties and 40-year-old people because of where we grew up and were exposed to our first elements of physical activity, I think continues to harm us, but there’s not some magical barrier that you tip over. And it’s only then that you start to experience the benefits in life, in many aspects of it with physical activity, with strength training. It’s dose response. So, it starts the second you start to move, the second you start to lift something.

Michael Dermansky (10:42):

Yep, absolutely. I mean, I still see one of the biggest problems where people start, “Oh, I’m going to get fit today and we’re going to exercise so it’s six times a week. And I’m going to do that for the next two months.” I’m like, “No, you’re not. We’ll be lucky have this conversation in two weeks from now.” And that all-or-nothing approach is like, I’m going to get fit today and got to do everything in one go. It’s a recipe for disaster. But if I hear that, I try to pull people back. It’s not going to work. It needs to be one, let’s start with one to two days or two days or three days, and then see how you feel and allow the body to do its job because you’re going to be doing this for 3, 6, 12 months, if you really want to see the real outcomes of what you do.

David Smith (11:18):

I don’t know where I got it, but it’s something that I tend to speak with or a lot of my clients about and tell them when they come in and I’ve got this to achieve in the next couple of weeks, or I’m going to do six days a week and I’m starting from zero. I say that, “People will always overestimate what you can achieve in one year, but people will always underestimate what they can achieve in 10 years.” And it just needs to reframe the time that this journey is. It’s a marathon versus a 100-meter sprint. So, setting realistic expectations on what people can achieve in the early time, but also getting people to look forward further and further in their journey becomes important.

Michael Dermansky (11:56):

Great. I heard Brad Beer talk about that in his podcast of a few weeks ago. Is that what he said, people overestimate what they can achieve in three months and underestimate what they can achieve in 10 years. I couldn’t agree with you more. You’ve seen people have been here with us for over 10 years and they can’t believe where they’re at, but the ones that have been here for two months and think, “Oh, how come I haven’t got that outcome yet?” “Well, because you haven’t done long enough yet. Sorry. It will happen. You just have to be patient.”

Michael Dermansky (12:20):

Talking about barriers, what are the biggest barriers that you find people have with exercising in this age? I mean, you’ve mentioned a few of them briefly, but what are the real barriers you find?

David Smith (12.:30):

Yeah, so time, obviously a big part of it, and value shifts. And the self-talk. So, the three key ones and I’ll go into maybe a bit more detail on them.

David Smith (12:39):

As I said, goal-setting should be based around aligning into our new priorities in life. Family values become a big part of it. Maybe you start to talk to your clients or start talking to yourself that, “Hey, if you’ve got kids and you want to feel like running around with them when they’re 20 years old and you want to be kicking a footy around the field when they’re in their teens and they’re playing their first games, exercise now.” “You want to have energy left over at the end of the day and not be stressed and hung out from a busy day at work, where you can be a caring father, a caring mother, a loving and supportive partner, exercise.” “You want healthy and active kids. If you think about the influence your parents had on you as a child and what you as a parent can now have on your kids in their early stages of life, this is the most influential part of their lives that will set them up for success.” So, talking to the parents, “This is the time you can set your kids up really well. Do you want to be setting a good example for them?” And changing the motivations and the goal-setting around that.

David Smith (13:36):

Obviously, people will start to prioritize their professional world. We’re no longer just fresh out of uni at this stage. We’re probably thinking about what are my aspirations as a professional in whatever area of work? Look, if you want to excel as a professional, in any sense of the word, then exercise. Our workplaces, of course, should be involved in this, but increased stress, which can be well-managed through regular physical activity. It leads to poor decision making through dysfunctional strategy uses. We have altered feedback processing. It affects our abilities to form long-term memory. It affects our executive functions and it’s detrimental in situations where we have to have high-profile, high thought-processing things. And it leads to performance shifts in our decision-making. So, talk to your clients and self-talk and understand that your physical activity is going to impact your professional world really positively too.

David Smith (14:26):

Especially if you work at a non-desk-based role, your physical health becomes even more important. So, it’s not just about the desk-based professional services roles, but trades and all other types of roles. Your body is your only thing you’ve got to be able to continue to work across the lifetime so we should be investing in it.

David Smith (14:42):

But the number one thing I think we can really help people is educate them on the perception of not having enough time. Now, I’d say when I do a lot of these seminars, I’ll ask these questions. “What is your largest barrier?” 99 out of 100 times, the largest barrier is, “I don’t have enough time.” While going out and stepping out of the office or going to work that little bit later or leaving work that little bit earlier or getting home a little bit later or leaving home a little bit earlier, it feels like it’s a massive upfront investment on your time, which is probably your most valuable resource. It’s understanding that by replacing desk time, replacing work time, well, actually, you’ll be better off in the long run.

David Smith (15:25):

There’s been some interesting studies where they looked at replacing 2.5 hours of a working week, so 15%. Let’s say, it’s a 40-hour working week. They got a group of people to work through all the way for those 40 hours. They got another group of people to only work 37.5 hours, but they made sure that those 2.5 hours were performing some form of physical activity. And then they assessed at the end of it, what was their levels of productivity? What was the quality of their work? And you’d better believe it. The person that spent less time at the desk, 15% less time at the desk, they actually produced higher-quality work. While they spent less time at the desk, there was an upfront investment of leaving the office or leaving the workplace or starting that little bit earlier. It actually pays off in the long time. And you’ll start to realize that that lack of time is truly a perception. It’s not a reality. It just takes a bit of time to get yourself there.

Michael Dermansky (16:17):

I mean, if you look at that as well, you look at any education, it’s a very, very similar thing. If you wanted to learn a new skill and you got stuck looking at the same desk with the same ideas and the same information, you can be looking at the desk with 40 hours and you get nowhere or you won’t get as far. But if you take that extra time to study and look at new fresh ideas, it’s amazing. You think that that’s got to be lost time, but it’s not. That it’s an investment. It’s an outcome. And it’s the same as physical activity.

David Smith (16:44):

Absolutely. Physically active people have a much greater ability to shift concentration and become less distracted. In those couple of hours after you’ve done physical activity, you may be working your way on some particular important piece of work. Someone comes in and interrupts you. With a physically active brain and a physically active body, your ability to then switch back attention and refocus on that piece of work you’re doing is almost instantaneous. Whereas people who are less physically active, and obviously all the brain health elements that comes with it, means that you’re losing a lot of time every time you get distracted away from your work and you’re more likely to get distracted. While it is an upfront time invested, it’s the greatest payoff you can be making within your professional world too.

Michael Dermansky (17:24):

Well, speaking of professional world, if you’re looking at yourself as well, do you follow your own advice? Are you physically active? Do you do regular exercise as well?

David Smith (17:33):

Yeah, I ride my bike to and from work each day. I’m probably at the opposite end of it. I feel incredibly beneficial that I was exposed to regular physical activity. I thank my parents for setting those skills within me, but I ride five times a week, 45 minutes each way. I strength train five days a week. And I’m obviously on my feet most days of the week. I of course, have opportunities to do so. I work in an environment that allows for that physical activity to take place, but I also choose to ride my bike each way versus getting on the train. It doesn’t add any time to my day. I have found it’s a really great way for me to get the important cardiovascular training into my working week. So, I absolutely live and breathe it. And I do it for the process, not the outcome. And I think that’s probably something we can talk about as well.

Michael Dermansky (18:23):

I mean, for me personally, I do my training three days a week as well. I did my session this morning as well. And I got a physical job too. I can’t work and be productive if I haven’t worked on myself. It’s just too hard. We encourage all the staff to do the same thing. Unfortunately, some do, some don’t and they can be more productive and they can be more physically active to have a better life.

Michael Dermansky (18:46):

Let’s bring up what you said. You do it for the process rather than the outcome. Tell me bit more about that.

David Smith (18:51):

I think it’s one of the advantages of working with an expert, with a professional trainer, with a physio, with an osteo because by learning skillsets to aligning why you physically active with more deeper meanings of the why, your values, your intrinsic person, it means that you’re less worried about achieving X and you can start to think about enjoying the process. If we’re learning along the way with our physical activity, then it helps us to create autonomy, so we feel like we’re in a bit more control of the process. It helps you develop levels of self-efficacy. And therefore, we start to meet a lot of our basic psychological needs, where if we only rely on those extrinsic motivators or those superficial goals, fat loss, muscle gain, which is obviously still very important, but it can’t be the crux of why we’re after it, then you’re constantly seeking the next thing. And that’s where you get caught up in, “I need to achieve X in 12 weeks,” versus, “This is a lifelong journey. Let’s enjoy the process.”

Michael Dermansky (19:54):

Yeah. I mean, it’s interesting. Because what you said is that the fat loss, muscle mass again is an outcome of the process, not always the goal. It’s the outcome of doing the right things.

David Smith (20:05):

It’s a lovely side effect of getting the processes right.

Michael Dermansky (20:08):

Yep. Well, in that case, you talked about the benefits of working with someone. Where should someone begin? I’m in my thirties or in my forties. I’m in my forties. Sorry. Say I haven’t exercised for the last 10 years because life’s just been too busy. Where do I start?

David Smith (20:24):

Look, I think given, as I said, time is a lot of the perceived barriers that people have. Find somewhere local to your workplace or to your home. Just go in and have an initial conversation. As a client, walking into a new facility, not everyone’s going to be a gym person. So, I encourage you to actually just walk in. And at first, does this feel comfortable? Does this feel like me? Without worrying again about what the outcomes or what type of exercise might be in that environment. Does walking into those doors make you feel comfortable? Was it easy enough where it’s going to remove some of those initial barriers that it’s hard to get to, or I’ve got to drop the kids off and then it’s all completely the opposite direction. So, finding somewhere that’s local to you is a strong starting point.

David Smith (21:09):

Then finding someone that you trust, and a really good way about that is most of us have got friends or family members or colleagues that are already involved in this process. Speak to them. Ask who they’re seeing. Word of mouth is going to be the strongest ability for you to go into a new environment that may be a little bit scary and a little bit uncertain for you. If you haven’t had a lifetime experience with physical activity and remove some of that fear responses, knowing that, “Well, my colleague, Jim, already sees that person. So, I at least know that Jim trusts them, so it’s a starting point for me.” Find somewhere local to you and find someone that you trust will be the starting point.

Michael Dermansky (21:51):

Great. How do you know if you’re on the right direction or in the wrong direction as well?

David Smith (21:56):

Yeah, I think people will often be wondering what are the physical outcomes, but the most important aspects to know that if you’re going in the right direction will not be physical changes. It’s going to be mindset shifts. You will start to become excited about the prospect of whatever your next piece of physical activity is, what you’re going to learn, what you’re going to develop from it. If you’re strength training and you’ve got your programs designed for you, you’re going to be looking through your programs and looking ahead at what’s to come. What’s my next training block look like? What does my next rep schemes and sets look like? How am I going to progress from the things I did last week?

David Smith (22:34):

I think the largest one that will set the tone, if we know we’re really heading in the right direction, is that your decision tree will change when presented with barriers and time restraints. You will see that your values and priorities shifted. It’s no longer, “I’m going to cancel my appointment with my trainer or my gym session because someone’s thrown a meeting into my diary.” It’s going to be going, “I can’t attend that meeting because I’ve got something that’s more important for me right now.” Most workplaces are really proactive about employee health and wellbeing and will most likely support those decisions. It’s often just a bit of a self-perception that you need to be chained to the desk, so to speak. So, I think the decision-tree change when presented with time and barriers is probably the largest one that’ll go, “Okay. Now I’m really heading the right direction. This is something that can become part of my life for the long term.”

Michael Dermansky (23:26):

Wow. I mean, I didn’t think of the world that way too. That’s a really good point. I can often see when people are in the right track, you can see their lives begins to be different. Things that they want to do are just easier. They can actually enjoy what they want to do as opposed to get through it, which is a very, very different feel. But that’s a really good thing that when it becomes a priority in their life and it’s a non-negotiable, as opposed to something they have to figure out how to do. That’s a really good point.

David Smith (23:55):

Yeah. I think the physical changes that will occur, are you on the right track. I think they come after that point because that’s when it’s become the consistency that you need to actually see those physical changes. But then of course, you’re going to want to see and you’ll know, because you’ll sleep better. You’ll get sick less. Our immune system’s boosted. You’re going to start managing those work stresses. So, you’ll have more time and energy for your family and your professional world’s going to improve. You’re likely to experience less pain and injury. Now, there’s no such thing as preventing injury, but you’re less likely to experience those aches and pains and little niggles and things that can start to occur when you get into your thirties and forties. You’re generally going to have greater confidence. Because exercise is a really important element to improving our self-confidence and it’s not domain-specific. So, it’s not like confidence you develop in the exercise world is only specific to the confidence in the exercise world. It flows into every other aspect of life. You’re going to have a better sex life. You’re going to have more energy for the things that you value, like your family and your profession.

Michael Dermansky (24:54):

Yeah. David, any last thoughts you want to tell listeners before we finish up today?

David Smith (24:59):

Yeah. I just want to touch back on the importance of strength training. Now, again, something that it can start to occur at this age, whether you’ve never been physically active, or university then straight into professional life then straight into family put the brakes on it. There’s a bit of a misnomer that when you start back exercising, that it needs to be gentler approaches. It needs to be… And I’ve used gentle in quotes because it’s not necessarily the case, but Pilates and yoga and cardio-type training. It’s not unusual for me to hear and for colleagues and other practitioners to hear where you’re starting first time and they’re wanting to get back in activity and use comments like, “You know what? I’d love to get going, but I just think I need to get a little bit fitter first.”

David Smith (25:43):

When risk to keep strength training should be the starting point because it sets the tone. And this is us as practitioners. It’s the media’s fault for this poor messaging. All this does is create additional barriers and fears to start something that’s so incredibly important.

David Smith (25:59):

Strength training is one of the most safest and effective forms of training that is possible for us to be doing. And it’s all about the dosages. It’s all about the types of patterns, how far regressed or progressed that pattern of movement is. That’s the difference for where someone starts, but everyone’s point of starting to whether they’re re-engaging with physical activity or starting for the first time is to learn how to effectively introduce strength training into your life.

Michael Dermansky (26:23):

Fantastic. Excellent. David, that is a great point to finish up with. That’s really, really good. We find the same thing. Strength training is probably the biggest, most important thing to start and the biggest barrier to stopping people achieving the outcome they want to achieve in their life as well. That’s fantastic.

Michael Dermansky (26:38):

Well, thank you very much for your time. It’s been great having you on the show as well. I hope the listeners got some really good, valuable information out of today’s podcast. We’ll finish it up there today, but great work and thank you very much for your time, David.

David Smith (26:50):

Oh, an absolute pleasure, Michael. It was nice to chat with you and hopefully some little good tidbits in there for everyone today.

Michael Dermansky (26:56):

Yeah, I think our theme of the last 10 podcasts has been strength training, strength training, strength training.

David Smith (27:02):

So it should be. So it should be.

Michael Dermansky (27:04):

Fantastic. Thank you very much, David.

David Smith (27:05):

Perfect. Thank you.

Voiceover (27:09):

Thank you for listening to The Confident Body. For practical articles to help you build a confident body, go to MDhealth.com.au/articles.