Ryan Reynolds’ longtime personal trainer Don Saladino focuses on longevity as much as aesthetics when working with his clients, regardless of their age or celebrity status.
“I don’t think it should change whether you’re 25 years old or 55 years old,” Saladino told Business Insider. “I really think that if you take that approach at an early age, you’re going to prepare yourself for a very, very bright future with your physical moving quality.”
Saladino is a big believer in the power of mastering the basics for better health, which longevity experts have previously told BI is the best way to go — despite “biohackers” increasingly sharing their expensive, but not necessarily science-backed, anti-aging regimes online.
“Not feeling good is something that a lot of people go through. And I’ll be honest, you don’t have to,” Saladino said. “I think it just takes dedicating 10 to 15 minutes a day to the right stuff.”
He advises people to focus on strength training (without overdoing it), walking, sleeping enough, and eating a varied diet with plenty of fiber.
“You’re going to move better, you’re going to feel better, you’re going to build confidence,” Saladino said. “And then I think it becomes much more motivating to do things because you’re seeing a result.”
Here are the five pieces of advice Saladino gives his clients.
1. Strength train
Whether celebrities or not, Saladino encourages all his clients to build as much muscle as possible. He thinks of muscle as “body armor” because it helps keep people healthy and independent as they age.
Muscle loss with age is known as sarcopenia, but strength training and eating a high-protein diet can help prevent this, he said.
“As we get older and we get into our sixties, seventies, and eighties, we want more body armor,” Saladino said. “For such a long period of time, you’d almost hear people say, ‘Well, I don’t want to be muscular, I’m getting older.’ And I’m like, ‘Wait a second. Muscle is protection.’”
Building muscle also makes your bones stronger, which combined makes you less likely to fall and less likely to have bone fractures if you do.
Saladino has seen a shift from people thinking strength training is only for male bodybuilders with aesthetic goals to realizing it has health benefits for everyone.
Research has linked weight lifting alongside cardio to living longer, as BI previously reported.
2. Train consistently instead of intensely
Saladino thinks it’s a mistake to go “full pedal to the metal” in every workout, and it’s a “misconception” that you should push yourself to failure in each session.
He advises people aim to finish each set of a strength exercise feeling as if they could do one to three more reps. This means that they’ve picked a weight and number of reps that’s challenging, but not too tough on the body.
“In time, quality diminishes, strength diminishes, you start losing motivation to get to the gym,” Saladino said. “It’s OK to downshift,” he added.
Pushing yourself is important for making progress, but finding the right line is key to sustainable training, he said.
There is some research to suggest that consistent, low-intensity workouts have a more positive effect on longevity than more intense exercise. For example, a 2015 study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology found that people who ran at a slow or moderate speed had a lower long-term mortality risk than those who ran faster.
3. Prioritize sleep
You often hear people saying getting up early in the morning requires discipline, but Saladino thinks going to bed early requires more.
“Sleep’s a job, it really is,” he said.
Saladino commends people who get up early to work out, but if they’re going to bed late too, it’s not as commendable. Much more impressive is having the discipline to stop watching TV and go to bed at a decent time, he said.
“That’s something that has to be trained, it’s difficult,” Saladino said.
Getting enough sleep is important for overall health but is also vital if you have fitness goals or are trying to lose fat. Research suggests people who are sleep-deprived are more likely to be hungry and overeat the following day.
4. Don’t forget fiber
Saladino encourages people to eat a varied, nutrient-dense diet containing plenty of fiber as well as protein, carbs, and fats.
“A lot of people consider their veggie as their carb. I do not,” Saladino said, “I consider our veggie as a very nutrient-dense fiber.”
Carbs like sweet potatoes or rice are great sources of energy, and vegetables are great sources of fiber — and our bodies require both.
Fibrous vegetables, Saladino said, “help clean us out and allow our body to be more powerful.”
“That is very important for longevity,” Saladino said. “It’s very underlooked, but it’s very important because this is going to allow our bodies to have more vitamins and minerals. Fiber is one of the most utilized areas of our nutrition. I call it the fourth macronutrient.”
The three macronutrients that make up all foods are protein, carbs, and fat, but Saladino thinks we should pay as much attention to fiber too.
In Blue Zones, regions of the world where people live longer than the rest of the population, high-fiber foods such as vegetables and beans are typically eaten in abundance.
5. Get your steps in
Walking is another underutilized key to health and longevity, Saladino said, and he encourages people to do it as much as possible.
“Our body’s going to feel better, we’re not going to be sitting as long, and I think good things are going to happen out of that,” Saladino said.
Getting more steps in could involve taking work calls while walking or taking the stairs instead of an escalator.
“I think walking is very low hanging fruit, that if people just started focusing on that, say, if you didn’t want to train at all and you just hated it, if you just want to focus on that, fantastic,” Saladino said.
For instance, a recent study published April 20 in the journal Communications Biology found that every two hours of walking or standing participants did each day was linked to a 12% higher chance of aging healthily, BI previously reported.
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