For women over 40...Can we build muscle?

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Replies

  • bumblebums
    bumblebums Posts: 2,181 Member
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  • argenamcadoo
    argenamcadoo Posts: 1 Member
    Very helpful... Thank you....
  • thibideau
    thibideau Posts: 19 Member
    Just turned 66. Have had both hips replaced. Started walking when I joined MFP in Oct.2012 and started 30 day shred 2 days ago. My muscles are screaming. Sure hope I will build muscle
  • mmddwechanged
    mmddwechanged Posts: 1,687 Member
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    BEAUTIFUL!!!!
  • Mustang_Susie
    Mustang_Susie Posts: 7,045 Member
    Obviously I'm not an over 40 female :tongue:

    BUT

    My wife is 40 and female, and all of her friends are 40 and over (or very close)

    and I know from experience that you can definitely build good firm muscle tone in your 40's.
    My wife is a body pump instructor, and one of her best friends is a 45 year old trainer that is in remarkable shape. It doesn't take hours and hours in the gym either, It's not so much about how long you work out for, it's about how well you work when you do (obviously, you need at least 3 times a week working out to build muscle, but other than that...). Best way to firm up and tone all over is to perform non-isolating routines. By that I mean doing exercises that don't isolate a specific muscle, but instead force you to perform a more complex move that encompasses many muscle groups. A good example of an isolation routine would be a Bicep curl. A good example of a compound exercise would be a squat thrust or a clean and press. With these compound routines you are getting an aspect of cardio, working multiple muscle groups, and strengthening antagonistic muscles that may not get the right amount or training with isolation routines.

    I'm 46 and started taking BodyPump a few years ago.
    Absolutely you can build muscle.
    I don't go very heavy with the weights but I can definitely see tonig and definition, especially in my upper body where the muscles are smaller and quicker to tone.

    BTW: my BodyPump instructor had a baby 2 years ago when she was 47.
    Didn't slow her down one bit (she teaches BodyStep and Attack too)
    She was over the top her entire pregnancy and put the rest of us to shame...:tongue:
    She has A-mazing muscles!
  • DebbieLyn63
    DebbieLyn63 Posts: 2,654 Member
    Well, I am almost 62 and need a hip replacement. Can I gain muscle?

    Of course you can. You just have to use your muscles consistently. You don't have to go to the gym and left heavy irons. You build and strengthen muscles just by using them. Walking, cycling, squatting, climbing stairs, all work your major muscle groups, and when you are carrying extra body weight, you are 'lifting heavy'. As you get down into a healthier body fat %, you can work up to intentional heavy lifting to sculpt your body like you want.
    And when you have a lot of extra body fat, you can strengthen and preserve a lot of your muscle mass while losing weight at the same time.
  • DebbieLyn63
    DebbieLyn63 Posts: 2,654 Member
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    BEAUTIFUL!!!!

    I love this! That is so going to be me!
  • purplecharm
    purplecharm Posts: 446 Member
    Ernestine Shepherd is a 75 years old bodybuilder and she did not start until she was 56.


    original.jpg

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIxmj_HHfWA
  • SanteMulberry
    SanteMulberry Posts: 3,202 Member
    Bump!
  • darrensurrey
    darrensurrey Posts: 3,942 Member
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  • LuciaLongIsland
    LuciaLongIsland Posts: 815 Member
    Well, I am almost 62 and need a hip replacement. Can I gain muscle?

    Of course you can. You just have to use your muscles consistently. You don't have to go to the gym and left heavy irons. You build and strengthen muscles just by using them. Walking, cycling, squatting, climbing stairs, all work your major muscle groups, and when you are carrying extra body weight, you are 'lifting heavy'. As you get down into a healthier body fat %, you can work up to intentional heavy lifting to sculpt your body like you want.
    And when you have a lot of extra body fat, you can strengthen and preserve a lot of your muscle mass while losing weight at the same time.

    I have been doing Just Dance. I usually do it for at least 45 minutes a day. I hope this is the beginning.
  • LuciaLongIsland
    LuciaLongIsland Posts: 815 Member
    Ernestine Shepherd is a 75 years old bodybuilder and she did not start until she was 56.


    original.jpg

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIxmj_HHfWA

    Inspirational!!!
  • Katbody10
    Katbody10 Posts: 369 Member
    where is California girl when you need her :D

    She got banned from posting on the forums from too many people stalking her posts and reporting her for posting too long posts and pics. :-(

    She is an awesome example of getting a rock hard muscular body at 50 tho! Her posts are a big reason I stuck with this after the first couple of weeks. If I had the success that she did, I would be posting my story all over here as well! Haters gotta hate.

    Here is her blog-

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/californiagirl2012

    Exactly who I was going to recommend! She's amazing .. 52 years old and HOT!
  • Katbody10
    Katbody10 Posts: 369 Member
    Ernestine Shepherd is a 75 years old bodybuilder and she did not start until she was 56.


    original.jpg

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIxmj_HHfWA

    Inspirational!!!

    Oh I love her too!! Amazing!
  • TheRealParisLove
    TheRealParisLove Posts: 1,907 Member
    Yes. I've lost about 17 pounds of fat and gained about 3 pounds of muscle since joining MFP. I can really see it best in my legs, but my arms are looking pretty muscular, too. One of these days I need to get some photos done that show muscle definition.
  • Mustang_Susie
    Mustang_Susie Posts: 7,045 Member
    3647838_460s.jpg

    :laugh: :bigsmile:

    I'm a nurse in a long term care facility.
    A few of my residents need to see this.
    Love it!
  • Hoop4la
    Hoop4la Posts: 68 Member
    I am 53 and would like to tone and build muscle - what do you advise i do ?
  • bubbli71
    bubbli71 Posts: 18
    Your muscles are there.. they are just wasted. The MINUTE you pick up a weight, even if its 1lb you are going to activate the muscle.
    The MINUTE you get on your knees and do one half push up.. the process begins.
    Wall squat with no weight... placing stress on your leg muscles which may shake and carry on because they arent used to it, will activate the muscle and get it working.
    Muscle isnt limited by age... its limited by disuse.
    Get onto bodybuilding.com and check out all the over 40's competitors and then you'll have no more questions about building muscle.
    I am 42 soon, and I adore lifting weights and being strong.
    Dont ever feel limited by your age. Pump those weights!
  • Mrsburris40
    Mrsburris40 Posts: 9 Member
    Hello Dawn!! My name is LaShun and know what you are talking about and YES YES YES it can be done( how do I know) good ? I did it I went from 210lb and a size 20 to 119lbs and a size 0 and build a competetors body in 10months of hard work it did take 3 years to burn all the fat off but 10 months of clean eating and lifting competely changed my body oh did I say I am 42 years young!!
  • girlykate143
    girlykate143 Posts: 220 Member
    Of course you can gain muscle past 40. I hope nobody actually put this idea into your head that it can't be done. I've had muscle hiding under my arm fat for quite some time. After the fat stripped off, wha-la, muscle. Then, there's the little sinewy muscles down my back and side (and my abs starting to show). I've never had those before and have been training 2-3x per weeks with weights for a few months now. One day with a trainer, then two days with New Rules of Lifting for Women workouts. Check it out. Great book.

    Of course, you will have to up your lean protein and not sit around eating bread and coffee and expect to gain muscle. :)
  • paulcer
    paulcer Posts: 167 Member
    At 48 years old and getting back in shape, I'm gonna have to say yes.
  • Hadabetter
    Hadabetter Posts: 942 Member
    Anyone can build muscle! It takes a caloric excess though. There are about 1800 calories stored in a lb of muscle (like there are 3500 in a lb of fat). You can't expect to gain more than about 1/4-1/2 lb of muscle in a week (NOT like .5-2 lbs of fat you can lose). So you only need about 100-200 extra calories per day when you're in a muscle-building phase. You also need to train HARD. It takes a lot of energy to build muscle, so your body will only do it if you constantly overload the muscles you have now and force it to adapt to that overload. That means training to failure, either through moderately high reps with moderately high weight, or fairly low reps with really high weight. Super low reps (<5) will primarily train the nervous systems and super high reps (>20) will train energy systems rather than cause muscle growth. Either direction will have to result in failure (inability to produce another rep with fair form), which indicates that you've recruited and exhausted all available muscle fibers.

    That said, if you need to lose 15 lbs, lose the 15 lbs first with a modest caloric deficit (nothing like 1,000 calories a day or you'll lose what muscle you have). Then concentrate on building. You can't pedal both ways on a bike, know what I mean?
    This +100.
    But expectations of gaining even an ounce or two of muscle a week may not be realistic for most folks, especially as one gets older.
    And a slow (3-5 second) lowering of the weight benefits you more than the raising of the weight.
    Hit all three types of failure on every set. (Can no longer raise the weight. Can no longer keep the weight from lowering. Can no longer slow the lowering of the weight.)

    Go "beast mode", but maintain perfect form (no squirming). Keep telling yourself that it's not really pain, it's only discomfort.
  • krickeyuu
    krickeyuu Posts: 344 Member
    Bump to read later
  • DianeandRocky
    DianeandRocky Posts: 3
    I'm a 57 year old woman, which has been fairly active all my life, exercise, dance etc. But the dreaded flab has crept up on me through the years. I'm not over weight 5'3 118 pounds, but loose arms and a roll around the middle prompted my husband (62) and I to work with a trainer.

    Even though we had been going to to the gym for 6 years, we had settled into a comfortable but now I see low results workout. We both looked around and thought there's 500 thousand dollars worth of equipment here and we are only using a fraction of it. So we searched for a trainer that would understand the 50 something situation and we found James. James is a 64 year old competitive body builder with a killer physique. He went right to work checking our body fat and working us up to the point where we were working out in the Advanced Training Center, (muscle man place).

    We are 2 months into it, feels so good to know there is something we can do at this age to improve our body, not just wait for nature to take it's course. There are days when I get discouraged, especially when I start looking on the internet and see "total transformation in 8 weeks", I don't think that's real, at least not for me, it may take 6 months or a year to really transform, but it took me 30 years to get this look, what is a year to get a new one? Our trainer James says that we are just babies now, which kind of gives me an idea of how far we need to go!:smile:
  • Lauren8239
    Lauren8239 Posts: 1,039 Member
    Holy crap, dead thread has risen! lol
  • Hoganac
    Hoganac Posts: 1 Member
    Of course you can build muscle at any age. I do not like qualifiers such as age, gender or whatnot. That is posing a question in a negative light before you even start -- such as, if one does try and fails, the built-in qualifier is there -- not the shortcoming of the person. So, never say never. With that, you must lift heavy without compromising form (do not look at men lifting weights -- most have it wrong -- too heavy, half reps, i.e., no gains) sorry fellas -- talking about the majority not the pros. And no new muscle will be evident without a cleaned-up diet. And I mean cleaned-up -- track all your food -- most people eat in a constant calorie surplus. This mean that you will, obviously, GAIN weight. And most people do not know what 1600 calories (or whatever your appropriate calorie allotment should be to lose) looks like. Use this app or another and really see. You must keep your calories high enough so that when you plateau you have room to adjust down. Yet enough of a caloric deficit to lose. Cardio should be a tool, not a means to an end -- your primary fat loss is through diet, not cardio. Cardio is done just enough to keep fat loss optimal, not as much as you can endure. Overuse of steady state cardio will backfire and over a long period of time, wreck your metabolism. HIIT, steady state and intervals all should be used sparingly, but used. Also, it's true what other poster said -- lose the 15 lbs. first, then start a serious muscle-building program by increased calories. You will obviously gain weight but there is not other way to gain muscle. After a good long period of building, you will diet down again to lose gained fat, all while continuously lifting heavy to maintain that new muscle. If you are serious about this, you can always hire a coach that will give you your diet and exercise program. The right ones are well worth the money.

    I've lifted weights now for 4 years; 2 years seriously with diet and my results have been unbelievable. And I'm well over 40. Good luck!
  • albayin
    albayin Posts: 2,524 Member
    I don't know about adding muscle (for any age) but you can definitely train your muscle at any age.
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