This morning I read a story about Japan populations. Apparently, Japan now has more than 40 000 people that are aged 100 years or more.
http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2009/09/11/japan-centenarians-record.html
It got me thinking about a conversation I had the other day with Jeroen, the coach of the European mixed country team that trains with us. Basically the debate was this. I figured that because I am an athlete, and therefore eat very well, don't smoke, don't drink excessively, get alot of sleep, exercise daily etc, I would be a likely candidate to live to 100. Makes sense right? Jeroen didn't think so, and I think his point is valid too. He figures that the exercise that I have to do to get to and stay at an elite level is actual harmful to my health. Each day an elite athlete breaks down there body in training. Doing this repeatedley over many years can't be good he argued. Of course we take time to recover, but all that training has to be hard on the body. Probably true. Will I live to 100? It's probably all genetics anyways...
Food for thought I guess.
7 comments:
hmmm depends... in a high impact sport that might be true.. what are the most common injuries for skaters? you could go look at some famous athletes and see how long they lived vs the national average.
Arguably it's the health of your heart... thus it should be that an elite athlete that doesn't #strain# their heart will actually live longer.
I for one, know that I'm suffering brain damage... Even if it is only slight damage, I know my brain isn't happy about it.
Be it all the falls or the drop of oxygen in my head during hard programs, they add up slowly. But hey, it might make for an interesting old age...
I've reached the conclusion that we'll live long healthy lives though. Apart from the back pains that we're going to suffer (maybe some ligament pain here and there), our heart should be healthy for a long time.
And knowing the type of people we are, we're going to stay active even when we retire from high performance sport...
It has been stated that all creatures have the same number of Heart Beats in a lifetime (http://www.billionheartbeats.com/index.php), there is a lot of speculation surrounding this though.
However if you take a look at an athlete and the stresses that they put on their heart you might be inclined to think that athletes would then not live as long as the average person.
The duration that an athlete has their HR elevated is usually for a brief period, and their resting HR is lower than the population so in turn they would on average have less BPM over an extended period of time.
Endurance athletes would technically use up more of their Billion HR during training because they have an elevated HR for a longer duration than sprinters. Liam might have you beat. But he could also be a vegetable in his old age.
Japan eats a considerable amount of fish and we all know of the anti-oxidant properties of the omegas in fish, they also eat a considerable amount less of refined wheat and preservatives because much of the food is dehydrated, and eat much more rice. There have also been a few studies on calorie deprivation (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health/the-secret-to-long-life-deprivation/article1212735/), and the long term effects on the body. Japanese eat far less calories than North Americans and NA's eat whatever they please. In that respect athletes who consume their calories based on needs rather than wants should be living longer unless they keep their diet the same when they are retired from sport.
Thats a good point about calories Al. I think that probably plays a pretty big role in the overall numbers of centenarians in Japan vs NA. We were talking about it on the ride this morning and figured that alot of the Japanese that hit 100 probably lived their lives tending small farms and growing a substantial amount of their own food, thus cutting down on like you said the refined part of their diet. This probably makes a huge difference
So diet pepsi = good...? Haha.
I personally plan to never die. Interesting stuff though about all animals having the same number of heart beats.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbiOy_LOLoU&feature=PlayList&p=858441B12FB2794B&index=0
is a wicked documentary about things that may happen in the future for healthcare and the like.
Saying you want to live longer is a nice excuse to not getting off the couch :)
DGraf
Hi Micheal,
interesting debate.. I was a elite athlete in several sports, diving, x-country skiing and hockey. In 1990 I was diagnosed with early onset Parkinson's disease. My doctors believed that the advancement of the disease was related to me pursuing higher level training at an early age (my first olympic trials was at age 15 in diving for the 1976 olympic games in montreal). Research has indicated that those individuals who use higher brain functions (such as acedemics and athletes) for focus and concentration and fine motor control; are actualy more susceptable to the disease. Food for thought.....
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