20 Something
May 5th 2007 13:57
Perpetual Youth is his, not yours.
If you are in your twenties, this one's for you. There will not be a period in your life when the physical side of training will be easier and more productive. There also will be no period when the rest of your life will intrude more into your training. If you get a clue about training now,however(both the mechanics and lifestyle), you will literally reap the benefits for decades. Moreover these benefits will be more than just big, showy muscles. You will be capable of rigorous activity far into the later period of life when your peers will feel the full debilitating effect of a lifetime of being sedentary.
To me the single most important thing that a 20something can do for him/herself is to learn to control the natural tendency to pick up unneeded weight. A recent story about basketball great Yao Ming reminded me of the centrality of this. Yao has been religiously lifting weights. He can now bench press 310lbs and weighs 302. When he came to North America he weighed just about the same and could not bench diddly. That means that the giant has done it right. He has gained muscle without gaining weight. If you can handle more weight but do not weigh more yourself, you are doing everything right. I challenge anyone in their 20s to consider this as their number one objective.
If you are a non-bodybuilder training may get the short straw when you transition from college to the workplace. If you are newly established in a career and weight training is part of your schedule, you will have no problem maintaining your training for year after year. The results will just be fantastic. If you drop weight training during your early career, it will get harder and harder to get it going again. If you try to start it up again, you probably will have already lost the battle with weight. Even a pound of new fat a year on an otherwise young, athletic body is like a time bomb. If you take time away from the gym it will probably be more. Set your priorities now.
If you set out to gain muscle but not weight in your 20's, nutrition will be a central issue. Everyone knows that young people can eat junk and get away with it to a certain extent. Let me tell you why that is so bad: You will develop what amounts to an addiction to sugar and carby food in your youth which will not only undermine your fitness then,but stick with you into the later decades of life, when naturally slowing metabolism will expose the harm of eating sugar and other junk(You'll get fat or at least fatter.) I must say that I truly don't know how much this natural fattening process can be limited. I will say that I know how it can be excelerated and so do you.
I will 20s people an insight: You will want to look good at 50, as much as you do now. At 50,however,you can easily have made a bed of blubber and disability that you will have to lie in. Looking good at 50 will be something extra special(if you achieve it),because you will know that you have earned it. If your weight at 50 is near what it was at 25, you will have done something invaluable for yourself. If you have bigger, better muscles you will be the man or woman. Please start today, Mr./Ms. 23 year old. Go weigh and measure yourself and put the numbers in your sock drawer.Every New Year's Day take them out and make comparisons. Your servant, as always.h
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