Last week I listened in to several webinars on aging. I have made it my life’s goal to live my life better as I age. I want to desperately escape the ill health that followed my father in his last several years and my mother also to some extent. I want to thank Kymberly and Alexandra of Funandfit.org for organizing this great summit.

The total two day summit consisted of six webinars. For free, you had 24 hours after they originated to listen to them. I managed to squeeze listening to four of the six into a week when my power was on and off due to electric work to better support my hot water heater and water pump.

Probably the most interesting webinar was given by Tamara Grand. Number one, she is someone I already “knew.” Probably, after those quotes, I should say knew of. I subscribe to her email newsletter for her website, FitKnitChick.com. She is an extremely intelligent almost 48 year old PhD. She talked about science, about biology, about hormones. I have a fairly heavy science background and could get into the things she was saying. She also talked about menopause – something I am always looking for more information on which is a post for another day. She also gave calls to action in four areas: exercise, nutrition, stress and sleep.

I also listened intently to Debra Atkinson of Voice for Fitness. She talked a lot about resistance training and scales not telling the whole story. The scale part is something I have always said is true. I probably started preaching this more as my kids got older and were plugging in scale numbers to software in PE classes to have a BMI number spit out at them.

The long and the short of what I heard in all four webinars is that training for older adults, those of us over 50, is different for younger adults. This was kind of like hitting me upside the head. I knew this in the back of my mind. Yet, I keep signing up for classes that are generic and designed by someone who is most likely 30 years younger than I am and not designing with a “more mature” body in mind.

All that said, I am still always looking to push myself so will be setting up a new training schedule that will include more resistance and strength training in the next week or so. I do not have a huge race to train but love to run so that will be my cardio.

Do you continue to learn as you age? What was your most recent learning opportunity?