This and as we know HIT can slow most of the aging processes. By slowing hormone loss we can maintain a higher level of metabolic as well as cognitive function.
Also I wonder if the older competitors in the study also trained more for endurance than V02 max. The new Masters Plans say we older folks ( I’m in my 70’s) might be better off with less HIT and more Z2 stuff. Makes me think ……maybe, maybe not.
I’m planning on being able to ride 100 miles on my 100th birthday so I’m still motivated to do those intervals.
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The hormonal theory of aging was discarded by science in the 1980s, if not earlier.
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Replying to the thread in general, Seiler has this video that covers a study of Masters Cyclists. Doesn’t really hit the 70+ age group too much, but the trend can be seen.
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I guess I did not interpret this study correctly.
You’re right, you didn’t: just because hormonal responses change with aging doesn’t mean that they are responsible for aging.
More to the point, you can’t stop or even slow primary aging by administering exogenous hormones, much less via high intensity exercise (which actually doesn’t have much of an impact on secretion of, e.g., testosterone).
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Rather than just being slow, I am going to choose to identify as an 80 year old
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And I kept hearing ‘push yourself’ as you get older. Do weights, run, ride, swim, walk, hike, row, etc.
It seems that just not stopping is more important than trying to kill HIIT workouts. Personally, I have raised my max HR, and lowered my BP and resting HR. All beneficial, but will I live longer because of that? A friends mom lived to 103, and on her 100 birthday screamed ‘NO ONE SHOULD EVER LIVE THIS LONG!!’. At some point ‘quality of life’ comes in I suppose. It’s ‘what you do with the time you have left’.
An older friend said that he’s winning more races because eventually you get to the point where there aren’t as many people showing up in that age group, and those left could be easily passed. He said ‘All you have to do is live long enough’. Well, there’s that I suppose. For people with a dark sense of humor…
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Age doping? Eventually they will have to have a machine that you have to be scanned into to race virtual races, to make sure you are who you say you are, and WHAT you say you are. Like the medical machine in Idiocracy! 
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I heard something along the lines of, “You don’t slow down cause you’re getting old, but you get old cause you slowed down.” In other words, keep going, don’t stop YMMV 
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We still have a few years riding.
He increased his VO2max by 13% at 103yo.
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Although Robert Marchand is dead, still made it to 108 and only took up cycling in his 80s.
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Here is the data for chess players, steady decline from 25 to 80 then a turn point
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Come on, if you’re going to quote an iconic line you’ve gotta get it correct….
“Why come you don’t have a tattoo?”
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I may need to watch it again. The most important documentary of this century
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I hate this thread.
[p.s. I’m trying to commission a painting of myself that I’ll put upstairs in the attic]
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Shared this with a friend who is an accomplished master’s skier, founded our biathlon program and is a data geek. His comment was “we’re in the early stages of dying” to which I replied then I have our theme song – Allman Bros ‘Whipping Post’ – ‘O Lord it feels like I’m dying’. Probably applicable to a bunch of TR workouts too! 
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I can’t remember who said it: ‘Everyday we are deciding how we are going to die’. Granted a simplistic view of ‘the event’, because many people have no choice when and how it happens, but they were getting at people that deny the things they do could/would kill them.
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If declining Maximal Stroke Volume (MSV) is the most likely cause of age related lowering performance, what training provides the best means of improving MSV? Further are the TR Masters plans targeting it?
Personally, at 73, I find the VO2Max workouts are very comfortable, but the Threshold and Under/over are increasingly demanding. Endurance and Sweet Spot being straight forward.
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