# Conditioning for us fat and old folks



## bigdogbuc (Mar 23, 2012)

As we get older, exercise seems to be less and less fun. For me, exercise has been at the bottom of my list of fun things to do for a good 20 years now. Throw in the daily stresses of life; work, family, children (now grandchildren) and exercise gets further and further from my mind. Couple that with a host of injuries throughout my life dealing with the dregs of society and I have plenty of excuses to just sit on the couch, much like I'm doing now, rather than exercise.

Then I remind myself, "Self, you're only 44 years old. Yes you feel 55, but you act like a 25 year old." For me, my biggest battle is the on again-off again smoking. Which seems to be more on than off at times. My other unfriendly ally is the 50 extra pounds I really don't need. I suffer from a genetic disease in my knees that has affected me since I was a teen. So I hate to run, though I've done my fair share of it. I am missing the A.C. Joint in my left shoulder from a fight taking someone into custody. And recently, I broke my arm assisting the sheriff's office taking a 16 year old girl with a felony warrant into custody. So really, exercise and I have all but divorced.

What I have found, is the significant improvement in my energy levels when I'm not smoking. As well as an almost immediate increase in my ability to breathe. My preferred method of getting some cardio-vascular workout is bicycling. Yep, bicycling. I loved to ride my bike as a kid and found, I love it just as much now. It is low impact and easy on the joints, get's you places quickly and is cheap. After a couple of weeks of no smoking, I find myself gaining stamina, increasing my energy levels and the ability to actually breathe. Go figure.

The other reason I like the bicycle so much is this; It has great potential for a bug-out vehicle* and allows you to move around stealthily in your environment. I work as the Head of Campus Security at a high school (and also as a Reserve Police Officer on a local indian reservation). Our campus sits on 29 acres of heavily wooded area with lots of trails in a rural community and is surrounded by hundreds upon hundreds of more acres of woods and wetlands. I began using my bicycle to patrol the campus. The reason is two-fold; 1. I'm not stuck in my office if I don't want to be and can spend hours just doing laps around the campus, off and on-road (getting lots of low impact cardio) and, 2. I can't count how many kids I have literally ridden up on, within feet, before they even knew I was there. They don't even try to run. Whats the point? My top speed is 15 miles an hour for several minutes. The best 17 year old Cross-Country Runner can't out-run or out-distance me.

*_Bicycles for bug-out have a lot of flexibility. You can tow things with them; the little carts you see people pulling their small children around in make great supply trailers. They can be outfitted to hold weapons; Hunters outfit bikes all the time. It allows them to quickly and quietly get into areas that motor vehicles aren't allowed to go. You don't have to worry about fuel. They're easily concealable behind bushes, in ditches or wherever you happen to be. They are easy to work on with a few simple tools and, with a couple of specialized tools, there is nothing you can't do to them. Bikes are everywhere and spare parts, such as chains, tires, wheels, inner-tubes, brakes, bearings etc., are easy to come by, or, a whole 'nother bike if that's what it takes. They're great for quickly and quietly moving through, or, in and out of areas that you don't necessarily want to attract attention, especially at night. And, if you really need it, you can buy a kit for less than $250 and mount an engine on it for emergencies (creating distance) or those really steep hills that you just don't feel like climbing. These engines get about 150 miles to the gallon and, depending on overall weight/load and gearing, you'll see speeds of 15 to 30 mph. As I said, my top speed is about 15 mph, maybe a little more. My cruising speed is about 10mph, at a nice gentle pace I enjoy. I can only maintain that for so long. Lance Armstrong I am not. But that little engine can maintain that as a minimal speed until it overheats or runs out of fuel. So bicycles not only provide me with the exercise I need, and make it mostly enjoyable, but they also meet my "get the hell out of here" needs._

For me, cardio is more important than strength training. I am more concerned with endurance, especially in a bug-out situation, than I am with bench pressing my weight. If I need to flee an area due to some sort of SHTF scenario, or fight for my life, I want to know that I have the ability to reasonably continue on. In my experience, more often than not, it is simply the ability to outlast the attacker/bad-guy more than the ability to over-power them. Am I a triathlete? Nope? Can I run a marathon? Nope. But I can get my groove on when needed.

While I don't completely discount strength training, I can no longer use free weights. To many things that can let go physically make it unsafe for me to do. Until I broke my arm, just a couple of months ago, and due to my shoulder, I did modified push-ups using the back of my couch. This worked my shoulders and biceps. I used 10 to 20 pound weights to do curls as well as these elastic band things that I haven't fully figured out yet for resistance training. For grip strength, I use the old school grip springs that you just squeeze. Now that I am rehabilitating my wrist due to the broken arm, I have whole new series of exercises I do to increase mobility, flexion and strength. Which, I recommend using these kinds of therapeutic exercises on all of your joints.

Point is, there is no need to be able to do the Iron-Man, unless you want to. There is no need to push yourself to maintain some pre-determined heart rate for a pre-determined time or count calories at every meal. There is no need to run 5 miles a day if you can't. Running is a discipline and must be done correctly to gain from it. I have no desire to spend the money, or countless hours, in the gym. And honestly, without a trainer who knows what they're doing, you are wasting that time and money as well as risking injury. A trainer helps you get the most out of your time and effort. But we need to move. We need to keep the fluids moving. Even the old car parked outside gets started once in a while.

We need to do what feels comfortable and push that comfort zone every so often. Let's face it, anything we do that makes us feel uncomfortable, even hurts, we have a tendency to stop doing it. Much like sticking your hand on a hot stove. But I recommend getting a bicycle for some exercise. You'll be glad you did.


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## pakrat (Nov 18, 2012)

Bigdogbuc – 

I’m 18 years your senior and couldn’t agree more. I’ve also proven to myself that you can move from a hurt’n weez’n old guy to a high endurance, walks younger men into the ground with a pack, well regarded old guy. It’s taken me 8 months to drop twenty pounds and build long-haul stamina… especially starting with a “bad” knee, rotator cuff issues in both shoulders and high blood pressure.

Not to go way into my methods, but I learned that for me things like weights, jump ropes, shooting hoops, running, etc just made things worse and hurt more than they helped. I just started walking twice every day… no excuses. I’d take Advil for the knee and do the walk. After a while the knee quit resisting. I haven’t had any issues for more than four months covering hard terrain with a 20lbs pack. I’m a little dubious about bikes, but I intend to drag my old Trek out this fall and give it a shot.

I used latex bands and did a lot of very slow range-of-motion extending exercises for my shoulders. I gradually increased the level of resistance and the number of reps. If it hurt… I stopped for a day or two and then started again with a lower level and worked back up. I’m shooting a 50+lbs compound bow comfortably… never thought it possible at my age with my shoulders.

My body began to get shift in various joints and I learned to do slow stretches, lying down, sitting and standing. I’ve been able to dramatically increase my core strength and flexibility by slowly working into oblique stretches, waist twists and deep bends. Now I’m doing 80 each rapidly. 

I just started doing regular sets of crunches and squat exercises to improve stability in my lower back. As my physical condition improves, I’ve increased the distance and difficulty of my walks/hikes. I carry bottles of water in my pack for weight. If it proves to be too much on long route, I pour a little out and keep going, but never stop. The hikes provide my aerobic development without pushing my blood pressure too far. My doctor has cut my BP med’s in half because I started getting dizzy spells from excessively low pressure. I love it.

This isn’t an ad and I’m not an old jock who just decided to tweak it up a little. Until several months ago, I sat at a desk all day programming computers and had done so for 20 years. I just committed myself to a slow gradual, but unyieldingly persistent pattern of development that didn’t abuse my body. I still can’t run any real distance and at 62 I need a little more rest than I used to, but my chances of being able to put a load on my back and hike my butt out of a bad situation have increased dramatically. As an old geezer, that knowledge feels real good. Anyone can do it if they decide they want to.


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## bigdogbuc (Mar 23, 2012)

pakrat said:


> Bigdogbuc -
> 
> I'm 18 years your senior and couldn't agree more. I've also proven to myself that you can move from a hurt'n weez'n old guy to a high endurance, walks younger men into the ground with a pack, well regarded old guy. It's taken me 8 months to drop twenty pounds and build long-haul stamina&#8230; especially starting with a "bad" knee, rotator cuff issues in both shoulders and high blood pressure.
> 
> ...


That's awesome! I remember about 5 years ago, after somehow having wound up in construction after semi-recovering from my shoulder injury (law enforcement was no longer an option after Labor & Industries was done with me after 21 months), I was forced to attend a week long Laborers Union testing/training "whatever they called it" (another story). Anyway, we spent the entire week doing nothing but manual labor; digging holes, moving bricks, building scaffolding etc. This was an effort by them to see if you could handle the physical demands of being a construction laborer. When the test came, we were scored, all of it timed. There were 25 people in this "class". I was the oldest person there by about 10 years. Despite most of the conditions I cited above, I had the second highest score out of everyone. I was beaten by a kid that was literally half my age. By 4 points.

At our ages, I don't think age (even ailments) has anything to do with being able to out-perform much younger people. It's drive, which my children's generation seems to be in very short supply of. I guess we have a point to prove. And keep up the good work! You're an inspiration.


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## Montana Rancher (Mar 4, 2013)

I am sorry but a 1000 word post is beyond my "GAF" level.

I feel you are a plant to distract us from talking about real issues.

Your first post was 100 post and your second post was ... 100 posts.

I feel you are a distraction, I have never heard of you and I've been on this forum for several months.

I smell a plant.


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## bigdogbuc (Mar 23, 2012)

Montana Rancher said:


> I am sorry but a 1000 word post is beyond my "GAF" level.
> 
> I feel you are a plant to distract us from talking about real issues.
> 
> ...


If you're actually a Montana Rancher, I doubt this is what you smell. What I smell is an antagonist and I really don't like being accused of things by those, as you put it, that "I've never heard of". I have been a member of this forum since March of 2012. I'm sure the profile information next to my screen name is not beyond your "GAF level". And I'll do the math for you, March of 2012 makes my membership 16 months, as opposed to your "several", which specifically, is about 4 months (March 2013). That actually would be considered a few. Not several. And if you have 713 posts on this website in that time period, I doubt you have time to ranch. And I'm not in charge of the counter on this website, so I couldn't tell how many post's I've actually made.

I was one of the first few members of the original forum. I was off of this forum for quite some time due to a computer crash and loss of my "favorites". This forum kind of went out of sight, out of mind. But now I'm back. As a matter of fact, I think I was the very first post in the shotgun section discussing my views on shotguns and them being the ultimate "do all" gun as well as one on low budget shotguns for the frugal prepper.

I have noticed that many of the older, original posts are no longer here and if I recall correctly, there was some sort of format change to this site occurring or about to occur when I lost my old computer. But whatever. If you find my post distracting, or above your reading level, then by all means, find another topic to read or try "Clifford the Big Red Dog". Either way, I don't care what you think you smell. Check your boots. And congratulations for counting to 1000. :-o


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## roy (May 25, 2013)

Bicycles also are better in high heat because of the cooling effect of moving faster throught the air. Down side is that you have to work hard to get a work out. Probably 15 mph is the lowest speed that would be comparable to running. A heart rate monitor is good on a bike to keep the exertion level where it needs to be.

Smoking is insane.

The older you get the more important it is to sneak up on getting back in shape. Lotsa old guys have dropped dead including world class athletes like Fixx.


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## Rigged for Quiet (Mar 3, 2013)

Cycling is my preferred exercise. Having had so many back and knee surgeries, running isn't my thing anymore either. The lack of impact is also the one down side to cycliing due to bone density. Cycling does nothing to maintain bone density.

Well outfitted mountain bike with racks and panniers can also be used as a mule. You can pack a ton of crap on a bike and simply push it along next to you without riding it. Refugees across the world have known and used this technique for a very long time.

I chuckled when I read the OP's line about rediscovering a childhood love of cycling. It's true. then of course, you finish that first ride and collapse in the yard, lol.


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## scramble4a5 (Nov 1, 2012)

Any exercise you can get is a good start. I dropped 27 pounds through weight watchers online and a combination of cardio and bicycling when the weather permits. For achy joints I take Move Free by Schiff every day. It takes awhile to kick in but once it does it really helps. I am 54 years old and feel great. Sometimes I need Advil but after all the years on my body I think I am in pretty good shape.

Walk, bike, swim. Whatever you can do.


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## Denton (Sep 18, 2012)

Those are very good ideas, all of you.

Look at what the army's go-to guys do. High reps with low weight with the free weights and some serious cardio. They aren't looking to enter into weight lifting contests, they are looking to survive under harsh situations and complete difficult tasks.

Sounds like survival, to me!


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## retired guard (Mar 7, 2013)

For me it's hiking on days off (Got lot's of hills behind the place and soft sand though easy on the joints does increase the cardiac aspect.)On my work days I ride my stationary bike while watching morning news weather and maybe an instructional recording before work and I've eliminated the elevator and use stairs during work. I've biked in the past but current highway construction (and the idiots blowing through the construction zone) make that not worth it for a few more months. I'll pick it up again then.


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