Decline with age

[Boxster]

I started on the indoor rower in my late 30s when unfit, and gradually got very fit indeed. I kept improving my times until my early 50s, when ageing overtook improving fitness etc.

It gets a bit depressing looking back at my 20-year record and seeing times I can no longer achieve!

My question is this: On a fitness session of say 6000 metres, how much would you expect your 500 split to decline each year? (Mine seems to be going down by about 1 second per year.)

[Rockin Roland]

The greatest decline in erging, directly attributed to natural ageing, occurs in your mid 40s. The exact age it hits varies per individual and their associated lifestyles. For someone who has no extended breaks from erging and is always in good physical condition, your 500m splits for a 6000m workout, will decline by 5 seconds over a 10 year period.

[hjs]

The greatest decline in erging, directly attributed to natural ageing, occurs in your mid 40s. The exact age it hits varies per individual and their associated lifestyles. For someone who has no extended breaks from erging and is always in good physical condition, your 500m splits for a 6000m workout, will decline by 5 seconds over a 10 year period.

That would be 20 second per 2k. Looking at the wr on the 2

Wr all 5.36
40 5.53
50 6.07
60 6.23 ?

So for the best certainly a bit less. If you keep training and keep free from major injurees, decline can be kept slow. But from roughly 40/45 no matter what we will start seeing serious decline. And for those who stop training seriously it will go very fast.

[Rockin Roland]

Certainly over the longer distances it would be 5 seconds per 500 m decline. I know that because the other week I did my first 5000 m time trial in years. It was at 1:44.2 500 m splits average pace. However, 10 years ago I was doing 5Ks in 1:39.2 average splits. But I believe the decline over shorter distances may be a lit less. At age 54 I did a 2000 m time trial a few weeks ago in 6:27 which is less than a 20 second decline over 10 years for me.

[hjs]

Certainly over the longer distances it would be 5 seconds per 500 m decline. I know that because the other week I did my first 5000 m time trial in years. It was at 1:44.2 500 m splits average pace. However, 10 years ago I was doing 5Ks in 1:39.2 average splits. But I believe the decline over shorter distances may be a lit less. At age 54 I did a 2000 m time trial a few weeks ago in 6:27 which is less than a 20 second decline over 10 years for me.

A group of one Roland. In general pure speed is more difficult to mantain, our fast twitch muscle sooner disappear. Training for speed and power is harder on the body. Aerobic work is less risky.

Very nice 2k btw.

[Boxster]

Some interesting answers!

I think just comparing the WR is dodgy because it is made up of different individuals each year. Some sort of averaging using a lot more data is really necessary.

Also, I think the competition/adrenalin factor in the Championships will have a bearing. My feeling is the decline on the 500m split would not be as bad under race conditions.

[hjs]

Some interesting answers!

I think just comparing the WR is dodgy because it is made up of different individuals each year. Some sort of averaging using a lot more data is really necessary.

Also, I think the competition/adrenalin factor in the Championships will have a bearing. My feeling is the decline on the 500m split would not be as bad under race conditions.

Yes and no.

The Wr show what the very best do, but... Ofcourse the people in their prime training for the olympics are the best trained, do the the most, have great motivstion, etc. also the very best don,t put up results a lot and often stop, do a lot less after their prime. So the decline could be less proberly if all factors are considered.
Motivation and staying healthy are important factors. Both are not easy to keep.

[coastline]

There is a calculator for age and weight "handicapping" available at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/ergogewcalc.html

Background information (in dutch) at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/symposium_oo.htm

[Bob S.]

There is a calculator for age and weight "handicapping" available at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/ergogewcalc.html

Background information (in dutch) at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/symposium_oo.htm

Interesting, but it seems to me that it is badly flawed in that it shows 21 as the peak. It is very likely that it is appropriate for some sports, but not for sports like rowing where endurance is an important factor.

[hjs]

There is a calculator for age and weight "handicapping" available at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/ergogewcalc.html

Background information (in dutch) at:

http://www.vierzonder.nl/symposium_oo.htm

Interesting, but it seems to me that it is badly flawed in that it shows 21 as the peak. It is very likely that it is appropriate for some sports, but not for sports like rowing where endurance is an important factor.

I hoped someone would say that Indeed bizar, and 21 is proberly before max even.

[gregsmith01748]

The best resource I have seen for this is the scoring methodology that Paul Harris maintains. He takes the number one rankings for each distance for each age and then fits a curve to that data to arrive a smooth function for an age related handicap.

Here's the curve for 2K


There is a spreadsheet with curves for all ranking distances at this link:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/228 ... -2012.xlsx

Of course, not all the best rowers log their times, but this is a bit more data than just looking at world records. By the way, it shows a minima for the shorter distances between age 25 and 30. For the longer events, the minima is drifting towards the mid thirties.

It's all downhill after that.

[left coaster]

Very interesting threat, some bright folks on this forum. I'm a noob, posted on intro in the general section just now.

I have an interest in aging (think we all probably do) and am wondering if anyone on the forum has researched, or tried out, changes in diet or training regimes in order to maintain VO2 max and exercise output as they age??

[lindsayh]

I have an interest in aging (think we all probably do) and am wondering if anyone on the forum has researched, or tried out, changes in diet or training regimes in order to maintain VO2 max and exercise output as they age??

It depends a bit on when you started training, general fitness, athlete type (slow/fast twitch) and the like but in my opinion if you are pretty cardio fit then it is important to counter the loss of power that occurs with aging whilst holding fitness. This means for me to keep the weights sessions going and concentrate OTE sessions as more power based rather than longer slower stuff. Keep the hard sessions really hard and do some serious short interval sessions. Still have to do the metres of course and at least 3 or 4 sessions a week. My Vo2 max etc haven't dropped yet.
Jamesg said something really smart the other day - once we are cardio fit we are actually training our bodies to more efficiently remove exercise induced waste by products from our muscles rather than trying to improve our heart/lung output.
Haven't changed my diet - still eat too much!!

[Cyclingman1]

http://www.joefrielsblog.com/2013/10/ag ... ining.html

http://www.joefrielsblog.com/2014/12/wh ... ining.html

[left coaster]

Thanks for the information folks!

Joe's blog is right in line with what I was looking for, greatly appreciated