Regular exercise is crucial to a long and healthy life, but it typically becomes harder and harder to stay active as we age. Time constraints aside, our body starts to feel the physical effects of the aging process, and things like joint discomfort or an acute injury can impact your mobility and inhibit your athletic prowess. However, it doesn’t have to if you connect with a physical therapist. Below, we explain how you can improve your athletic longevity with the help of a physical therapist.
Staying Athletic As You Age
Many athletes dream of going pro when they are young, and while the reality is that only a small fraction will ever make it to the big leagues, that doesn’t mean that involvement in exercise and athletics needs to fade as you get older. You probably have some active and athletic hobbies, and we want you to be able to pursue these activities long into your golden years. Golf, cycling, Pickleball and swimming are all popular pursuits among retired individuals, but you need to make sure that your body can handle these physical activities at this stage of life. To do this, you’ll want to improve your athletic longevity, and a physical therapist can be the perfect resource.
As we’ve talked about on the blog in the past, a physical therapist can help take your athletic game to the next level, but for older adults, oftentimes the focus is on maintaining athletic ability instead of vastly improving it. You’re less concerned about your sprint speed and more concerned about being able to maintain balance and flexibility when you’re participating in the sports you love, and that’s where a physical therapist comes in. Some of the ways we work with older adults to improve their athletic longevity include:
- Strength Training – Muscles can start to weaken over the years, especially if we aren’t as active as we used to be. Through targeted strength training exercises, we can help you maintain or even build muscle strength so that you can continue to perform the actions and motions required of your sport.
- Improved Range Of Motion – Ligaments and tendons can lose some of their natural laxity as we get older, and that can stand to limit your flexibility. Decreased range of motion can affect your ability to comfortably swing your arms or bend your knees, so we can teach you some simple exercises that slowly help to maintain and expand your comfortable range of motion.
- Balance And Coordination – As we alluded to above, balance and coordination are key principles of any active hobby, but degenerative changes can negatively impact our balance and coordination. It will take a concentrated effort to maintain these brain-body processes as we age, and we know how to train your brain and your body to continue carrying out these processes efficiently.
- Injury Prevention And Treatment – Much of staying active as you get older involves avoiding injuries and overcoming them once they develop. Untreated or poorly treated injuries can cause symptoms to linger, and symptoms like pain, joint stiffness and swelling can prevent you from pursuing physically challenging activities. Keep different areas of your body strong and stable with the help of a PT program, and connect with a physical therapist if a new injury is keeping you away from the activities you love.
- Related Lifestyle Choices – Finally, many people young and old don’t realize how important it is to make smart choices in other aspects of their lives if they want to improve their athletic longevity. Consuming a healthy diet full of key vitamins and minerals, participating in dynamic warm-up and cool down routines and regularly getting at least seven hours of uninterrupted sleep all help our body refuel and recover so that it can once again be ready for the demands of physical activity. Our team of physical therapists can review other aspects of your life and explain how simple tweaks can make it easier for you to stay active as you age.
So whether you want to vastly improve your athletic performance or simply stay active long into your golden years, we’re here to answer the call. Let us help improve your athletic longevity so that you can continue pursuing all the athletic endeavors you enjoy. For more information, or to set up your first appointment with a member of our team, give OrthoRehab Specialists a call today at (612) 339-2041.
PT of Costa Rican National Soccer Team for 2007 World Cup in Victoria, CAN. Clinical Instructor for University of Minnesota Doctor of Physical Therapy Affiliations
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