The doctor is an idiot, indeed.
I do heavy (as in over 500lbs deadlifts, 400+ bench, 450ish deep squats) several times a week.
Lots of kettle ball work, Turkish get ups, pullups, etc.
Sprints and walking, no jogging.
I am 50 and look like I am in my 20s, less the grey hair.
I am 59 and started to work out again about 6 months ago.
I was trained in my 40’s by a guy named Ron Lacy former Mr. America and runner up Mr. World in 1957. He was 68 or 69 when he started training me. He never stopped lifting till he died at a block party in Lexington, Ky, dancing to ‘40’s music and his heart just stopped, so I heard. His warm up bench press was 240, I helped load the bar for squats and it was over 400 pounds. Myself and one of his sons spotted for him in his garage. He trained 6 preachers and one heathen, at that time I was the heathen. Ron was a deacon in the big Baptist church on Main Street and a humbler, nicer guy you would be hard pressed to find. The women were still chasing him up till his death. The Lexington Herald-Leader would come by each year and take photos and do a kind of pre-obit.
I worked in the coal mines till in my 30’s, hard physical work, my dad was a slave driver. Jumped out of an airplane when I was 42, don’t recommend it, I have had a broke back, have bulging discs, degenerative disc disease, sciatic nerve damage, arthritis of the spine, junk knees (crawling in low coal tends to do that), my left hip is junk, and I work out and hold a part time job. I do take meds, Bayer aspirin, various vitamins and supplements. My resting heart rate is 52 my blood pressure is 110 over 60 except when I am P.O.ed then it jumps to 110 over 60. I smoke 2 and a half packs a day and last time I had a breathing test I was 54 and blew into a machine, they told me I had 98% of the breathing capacity of a 50 year old non-smoker. Good genes I guess.
If I sit around I tend to lock up so other then typing at my computer I am actively doing something. I figure it this way, when I die I will rest, till then I plan to live.
I bought a kayak a couple of weeks ago and when I can figure out how to get in the thing I am going down the Cumberland, have rafted it before in my 40’s, this way should be more fun if I don’t bash my brains out on a rock or drown.
My vision is getting worse, with glasses it is now 20/15 from 20/10 and the doc tells me I have plus 1 glaucoma which I take it is not good. I can shoot anything and hit anything I shoot at if I can see it, and I see pretty well. My memory sucks but everything else functions pretty well. My hair in recent years has moved from my head to my back and I now wear a size 13 shoe up from 12 and a half. Have no idea why. I am irresistible to women and have told I am full of crap by same. Dogs and cats like me.
All that stuff aside, if what I foresee does come to pass, it behooves us to get in the best shape we can, sharpen our skills and be prepared for whatever may come. Old is a mental condition, it is all in your mind. I am mentally 16 while creeping up on 60. If I acted my age and condition I would be in a wheelchair, the only thing with wheels I ride is my pickup and Z3. I am going out with my boots on as my dad did, he got into the ambulance under his own power and was dead 3 hours later, black lung. He never gave up and I’ll be damned if I will either.