By the time you’re thirty-years-old or more, you’re going to need a well-educated exercise training coach. It would be really helpful in high school, but we’re a long way from that level of enlightenment. Without that expertise, your exercise is liable to be far less impactful over time. At best, you’ll just be doing some maintenance work, not the cutting-edge stuff focused on a healthy longevity.
Why do I say this? I’ve been working out with coaches for about a dozen years. Over that time period, I ‘ve worked with four different people. Three of them had to be instructed, as best I could, into personal needs. And though I’d read through plenty of books and watched others work out, I had no full sense of what an 80 or 90-year-old needed, much less the ability to focus on these needs.
And then I found a grad-school-educated exercise coach.
Some of the stuff I’ve learned about my body over the years was just plain inaccurate. Almost useless. Why? I really didn’t know what I was looking for to stay fully active. Furthermore, I didn’t understand my body enough to make an accurate decision about what’s really useful. In fact, if I’d found out what was useful, I lacked the knowledge of form as well as the diagnostic ability to know when the behavior was on target and when not. Even more seriously, I lacked the knowledge to assess a personal coach’s expertise.
But I’ve recently learned that drastic changes in the discipline took place in the early 21st century. So if your coach was educated prior to the last 15 or so years, they’re largely unaware of the discipline changes and offer little competencies for impacting aging after 40 or 50 years. My experience reveals that if they only finished a bachelors, they need to have been mentored by someone with still more education. Though that may seem to be an unrealistic expectation, that’s also true in other disciplines.
Unless a physician either teaches in a graduate medical school or was trained in this century at a top research center, they’ll be much out of touch with the changes in medicine. Furthermore, research reveals that slightly less than 5% of physicians and PhD''s ever pick up a piece of research after their degree is in hand. That degree is a bird in the hand that may fly for five to ten years. But after that, the bird has a broken wing and can't fly very far. I have a history of that kind of two physicians, both of whom, if I'd believed would have left me in a very sad shape, perhaps even quite dead. Thankfully, I had enough self-awareness to suspect that their recommendations were bullshit. And thankfully also, I knew where to go for rescue and care: to the emergency department of the University of Minnesota Med School.
Since the old rule is to get to the universal through the specific, let me explain with an extended personal example.
People educated in one of the better med schools understand that the traditional focus on medicine as treatment of disease and injury, though of much value, and still highly useful, now requires a mind-shift. A new mindset. Recently educated physicians recognize that they must give much greater focus to prevention than treatment. That plays out in intriguing new forms. My internist at the med school has me undergoing extensive lab tests every year. The purpose with this evidence focus is to identify strengths and potential weaknesses so that I can then make the necessary behavioral changes for living a quality life. For example, my recent A1C indicated that I was pre-diabetic. As a consequence, my internist recommended both diet and activity changes. Changes which I am taking seriously in both nutrition and activity.
I’ve had a peripheral neuropathy for more than thirty years, a disease that leaves most disabled or incapacitated. Yet years ago, I found a university orthopedist who suggested regular exercises to not merely cope with the disease, but avoid its impact. I’ve remained highly functional. But it was only three years ago that I finally located an exercise specialist that knew exactly how to coach me so that I could not only remain highly active, but actually build my strength, balance, flexibility and cardio health. The shocking fact about this is that the other three or four coaches I worked with were essentially clueless about a development plan for neuropathy and longevity.
As a consequence, my physicians and my physical therapist have said “I don’t know what you’re doing, but keep it up.” How's that for discipline honesty? Specialization that will keep me healthy at ninety years of age requires an internist, a neurologist, a therapist and an exercise specialist with an added background in nutrition. I’ve long since decided that physicians who weigh in on exercise or nutrition are clueless about both. My son-in-law, now 59 years old, a Chicago, Penn, Harvard educated MD, PhD, agrees fully with me. Some years ago, he commented that he had a half day of nutrition instruction and no exercise instruction during medical school—and that was it at three of the finest med schools in the world.
But as a result of my coach’s work, I check in with my physical therapist just once or twice a year, no longer need a neurology appointment, and check in three times a year with my internist for a brief 20-minute session so he can make certain I’m up-to-date. “Maintenance work” is what my internist calls the sessions. Today, all of this is covered by my social security and health insurance, except for my coach’s fee. So I’ve prioritized that fee.
What still remains shocking to me about peripheral neuropathy is that the huge majority of people with the disease succumb to electrical carts, wheel chairs, walkers and an early, painful demise. What I’ve learned from my brilliant coach is that balance is tied to strength. A couple weeks ago I started dead-lifting a one-hundred-pound barbell. When I asked my coach about the hundred-pound lift, he responded that I’m the only ninety-year-old in his history to lift that much. Knowing his research orientation, I know all that is going into his mindset: strength training impacts both my balance and flexibility for the good. So, a great deal of my exercise is spent on building strength in my entire body, legs, arms, and core—along with solid development of new balance, flexibility and cardio competencies. My go-to exercise is 3 sets of at least three minutes each of boxing (punching bag), interspersed with three or four sets (10 each) of TRX squats.
When I’m planning to go on a long walk or to unfamiliar terrain, I take a single trekking pole with me and only use it as necessary. I also have a four-piece folding pole that I can carry with me on a plane trip. After sitting for a long period, I will use it down the walkway to reception, But by the time I’m into the reception area I’m just holding it and not using it. I do a lot of computer work, but I’m scrupulous about a five to ten minute walk every hour of the day. I don’t need a pole in familiar terrain. So, I usually add an up/down flight of stairs to my brief, regular walking.
A few months ago, I was watching a young man, probably in his late twenties, doing some minor work on his soccer knee at our apartment fitness center. I commented that my coach could probably devise some better exercises for his problem. He asked me to check. My coach’s response was a surprise: “I wouldn’t touch that knee until I’ve seen the therapist’s report.” When I touched base with the young man a month later, he was momentarily shocked. But evidently did nothing about it. I thought to myself, “Yeah, I was invincible in my twenties. But I now know that’s nonsense. None of us is truly invincible.”
I suspect that a few years from now, credentials will be required for coaches that desire to be a part of medical insurance programs. But those days, sadly, are not with us yet. It limits the future for many, perhaps most adults. So, make certain you get this: you’re going to have to educate yourself about your whole health. Nobody has the single expertise to provide all that data. My coach, however, knows how to take the reports from medical physicians and physical therapists and apply them to my training program. You can only rely on specialists to answer the questions in their narrow discipline. Exercise coaches—with the cutting-edge background--are becoming an absolute must in the new health programs if you desire fulfillment and healthy longevity .