San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Exercise: Personal trainers help seniors stay active
With the right attitude and perhaps a few adjustments to their workout routine, seniors who want to stay fit may find age really is just a number, according to Bay Area trainers who specialize in older clients. And though coronavirus has disrupted many fitness classes and group activities, options abound for solo workouts at home or outdoors.
“A lot of seniors are insecure about what their bodies can do still,” said Jennifer White, a certified personal trainer in San Francisco. “I like to give them the motivation and the security that they can do things like they’re in their 30s,”
She taught classes for nearly seven years at the Jewish Community Center in the city until the pandemic forced its temporary closure and now trains her clients, half of whom are seniors, via Zoom.
“With the right guidance and the right motivation, there’s a lot that seniors can still train themselves to be able to do,” White said. “I like to give people that hope, honestly, when they have the right attitude.”
White points to an 84yearold male client who has not only become comfortable walking without canes but “is able to do full squats on his own,” and two women entering their 60s whom she taught to do full pushups. “They can both do 10 pushups unassisted,” she said proudly.
For those who can’t work with a trainer, White recommends “walking on a treadmill, going for walks, rowing, swimming, yoga ... and strength training on your own — squats, lunges, bicep curls, shoulder presses, triceps exercises. You could run those the rest of your life.”
Dan Dieguez, a certified personal trainer in Menlo Park who has specialized in fitness for seniors for 15 years, also emphasizes the importance of “functional” strength training, which he defines as “doing exercises that support your daily living activities and sports, if you do any.” This type of training, which can also be done by oneself, “trains movements, not muscles,” he notes.
Those key movements include pushing, pulling, twolegged exercises, singlelegged exercises, rotating your body side to side and bending at the hips, according to Dieguez.
Doing pushups or chest presses, for example, can help with “pushing a lawnmower or a revolving door, or catching yourself if you fall.” Exercises that involve pulling strengthen the muscles used for raking leaves or pulling clothes out the dryer.
Practicing squats is useful for getting up from a chair or off the toilet, Dieguez noted, while doing lunges will help you tie your shoes, get out of a bathtub “or if you happen to trip and you stick your leg out to stop it.” Hip hinges, also known as dead lifts, will keep you in shape for picking up groceries or anything heavy, Dieguez said.
Dieguez also takes his clients hiking in areas with hills, bringing along weights to increase the intensity of the exercise.
“Going up and down hills is like doing lunges,” he noted. “We’ll also stop along the way and do pushups on a fallen tree or another elevated surface like a sturdy fence.”
Tracie VanHook, a certified personal trainer in Menlo Park, has focused on “aging adult fitness, ages 40 and up,” for the last seven years of her 31year fitness career. She recently started Fit to the Core, a nonprofit that introduces small group and oneonone training to underserved communities such as Menlo Park’s Belle Haven neighborhood.
Both her private and nonprofit instruction emphasize functional exercises, where little to no equipment is needed. Doing the arm exercise known as wood chops, for example, is “the same movement as putting on your seat belt or playing golf and tennis,” she said.
VanHook also believes it’s never too late to begin training.
“I had a person who was 81 who was afraid he wouldn’t be able to play with his grandkids and would lose his mobility, so he really wanted to start with me,” she said. Another client in her late 60s has improved her core strength and balance, which could “help her avoid falls and back pain,” VanHook added.
She also encourages clients to take advantage of group activities in safe settings, such as online or outdoors.
“The social aspect is really, really important for seniors,” explains VanHook. “I encourage my clients to participate in a walking group; it’s social, but you get exercise. Or go to the pool and do water movement there. It doesn’t have to be focused on the fitness part; if they like to hike and see nature or do birdwatching, I definitely encourage that.”
Whatever form of exercise they choose, seniors will find multiple benefits, according to Dieguez.
“Exercise is the real fountain of youth, as said by scientists and many others that study this stuff,” he said. “It’s true: It not only helps your muscles, but also your brains, your immune system, your mood and your thinking.”
“With the right guidance and the right motivation, there’s a lot that seniors can still train themselves to be able to do.”
Jennifer White, a certified personal trainer in San Francisco.