Testosterone poisoning and taekwondo-- they don't mix well.
I get along great with all our instructors. One of them was on the national team for almost a decade and has been working out for his entire life. He grew up in a dojang and he's probably in his 30s. He's about 5'8" and maybe 110 pounds soaking wet, which is a great sparring combination. He's always cheerful and enthusiastic, always encouraging us to try harder to do better. At his age, he has scant appreciation for geezer students whose physical condition and recovery are not what they used to be. He's not offensive or intolerant about it-- just genuinely surprised to learn that he's the only guy in the dojang who can do 20 pullups in one set. It brings out my competitive side, and it's not always pretty.
So on Wednesday night we had a good hour, and I went hard as usual. At the end of the class we lined up for a few minutes of physical conditioning-- mostly pushups or situps. Last night, however, he wanted to do squats. I can do squats. He started with 50. No problem, I do that many with weights when I'm working out with my spouse. So I did 50 squats, no weights, each leg bearing half of my body weight.
Then he called for a second set of 50-- side squats. One leg extended to the side, squatting on the other leg. It's about 75% of your bodyweight on the squatting leg. That's more weight than I usually work with, but I gritted my teeth and got through it.
Finally(!) he called for five single-leg squats. I can remember doing those during quiet, boring midwatches when I was in my 30s, but that was 20 years ago. How hard could that be now, despite two torn ACLs? Turns out that I couldn't go all the way down, and I couldn't hold my other leg off the floor. I might've been able to do them if they'd been in the first set. But I struggled through what might someday look like five single-leg squats.
As we bowed out and walked off the floor, I realized that both of my hamstrings were cramping up. I stretched them out (again) and managed to get home, where I stretched out (yet again) and took 800mg of ibuprofen. But all night long I could feel my hamstrings on the verge of cramping, and just turning over in bed would wake me up.
This morning was more of the same, including ibuprofen with breakfast & lunch. My legs were on fire from the bottom of my spine to the backs of my knees. I stayed active with more stretching and light yardwork, so my muscles got better. It's been almost 24 hours now, and I've gone from "perpetually cramping" to merely "sore". I should be OK tomorrow-- just in time for spouse and me to work out. Hey, maybe I'll do some squats.
After eight years of taekwondo, recovery is getting to be a problem. Every year I do less of it, but this keeps sneaking up on me and hitting me over the head. Every Mon & Wed night I come home from taekwondo tired & sore (even without squats) but generally happy. I sleep like a log (6-7 hours) and I'm usually dragging the next day. But after nights like last night it takes a lot longer to recover. I'm already working out 3x/week with spouse, and surfing 2-3x/week. Taekwondo fills out the week but yardwork means that I'm occasionally doubling up-- 7-8 workouts/week.
However my daughter loves taekwondo & kickboxing, so I have to talk it over with her first. When she comes home from college on winter/summer breaks she enjoys the [-]victory laps[/-] workouts, and we occasionally even go to Friday-night sparring. It's quality father-daughter time. Of course she also has a lot of surfing to catch up on so I'm usually exhausted by day 5 of her "vacations".
Taekwondo is good for my joints, my reflexes, my speed (what's left of it), my kinesthesia, and my proprioception. Surfing is pretty good for those too, but they're two different levels of effort and execution. I don't think I could do it all with just surfing. I'm reluctant to give up taekwondo until I'm at least in my 60s, but that's going to require me to learn to back off from the heroic exertions.
I've looked at other martial arts, but nothing seems as good as taekwondo. Anything involving joint locks or grappling or throws is out-- my knees have had enough of that. Muay thai, staff work, escrima, and MMA are probably more intense than taekwondo. I'd hate to think that the next step is straight down to tai chi.
I can't believe that my body has slowed its repairs so much. I have the cardio, the strength, and the endurance. I just can't seem to do more than one workout a day for 5-6x/week at the level I want to do it. I already take a full load of vitamins. I'm already pretty much paleo & protein, very little carbs or sugar (chocolate), lots of fish & fruit. My drinking days are behind me, and I don't even like soda. A frozen yogurt and a half a pizza a week is about the limit of my depravity.
I'm getting "Younger Next Year" back out of the library to see what they say about recovery. (Thai massage? I could live with that.) I'm going to talk to one of the other taekwondo instructors about how they've handled geezers, but this is a young dojang and I'm the oldest one by nearly a decade. Eventually I'll have to tactfully & respectfully inform our enthusiastic instructor that I'll be doing "geezer reps" of his exercises instead of trying to keep up with the younger whippersnappers.
Any other ideas? Am I missing anything else?
I get along great with all our instructors. One of them was on the national team for almost a decade and has been working out for his entire life. He grew up in a dojang and he's probably in his 30s. He's about 5'8" and maybe 110 pounds soaking wet, which is a great sparring combination. He's always cheerful and enthusiastic, always encouraging us to try harder to do better. At his age, he has scant appreciation for geezer students whose physical condition and recovery are not what they used to be. He's not offensive or intolerant about it-- just genuinely surprised to learn that he's the only guy in the dojang who can do 20 pullups in one set. It brings out my competitive side, and it's not always pretty.
So on Wednesday night we had a good hour, and I went hard as usual. At the end of the class we lined up for a few minutes of physical conditioning-- mostly pushups or situps. Last night, however, he wanted to do squats. I can do squats. He started with 50. No problem, I do that many with weights when I'm working out with my spouse. So I did 50 squats, no weights, each leg bearing half of my body weight.
Then he called for a second set of 50-- side squats. One leg extended to the side, squatting on the other leg. It's about 75% of your bodyweight on the squatting leg. That's more weight than I usually work with, but I gritted my teeth and got through it.
Finally(!) he called for five single-leg squats. I can remember doing those during quiet, boring midwatches when I was in my 30s, but that was 20 years ago. How hard could that be now, despite two torn ACLs? Turns out that I couldn't go all the way down, and I couldn't hold my other leg off the floor. I might've been able to do them if they'd been in the first set. But I struggled through what might someday look like five single-leg squats.
As we bowed out and walked off the floor, I realized that both of my hamstrings were cramping up. I stretched them out (again) and managed to get home, where I stretched out (yet again) and took 800mg of ibuprofen. But all night long I could feel my hamstrings on the verge of cramping, and just turning over in bed would wake me up.
This morning was more of the same, including ibuprofen with breakfast & lunch. My legs were on fire from the bottom of my spine to the backs of my knees. I stayed active with more stretching and light yardwork, so my muscles got better. It's been almost 24 hours now, and I've gone from "perpetually cramping" to merely "sore". I should be OK tomorrow-- just in time for spouse and me to work out. Hey, maybe I'll do some squats.
After eight years of taekwondo, recovery is getting to be a problem. Every year I do less of it, but this keeps sneaking up on me and hitting me over the head. Every Mon & Wed night I come home from taekwondo tired & sore (even without squats) but generally happy. I sleep like a log (6-7 hours) and I'm usually dragging the next day. But after nights like last night it takes a lot longer to recover. I'm already working out 3x/week with spouse, and surfing 2-3x/week. Taekwondo fills out the week but yardwork means that I'm occasionally doubling up-- 7-8 workouts/week.
However my daughter loves taekwondo & kickboxing, so I have to talk it over with her first. When she comes home from college on winter/summer breaks she enjoys the [-]victory laps[/-] workouts, and we occasionally even go to Friday-night sparring. It's quality father-daughter time. Of course she also has a lot of surfing to catch up on so I'm usually exhausted by day 5 of her "vacations".
Taekwondo is good for my joints, my reflexes, my speed (what's left of it), my kinesthesia, and my proprioception. Surfing is pretty good for those too, but they're two different levels of effort and execution. I don't think I could do it all with just surfing. I'm reluctant to give up taekwondo until I'm at least in my 60s, but that's going to require me to learn to back off from the heroic exertions.
I've looked at other martial arts, but nothing seems as good as taekwondo. Anything involving joint locks or grappling or throws is out-- my knees have had enough of that. Muay thai, staff work, escrima, and MMA are probably more intense than taekwondo. I'd hate to think that the next step is straight down to tai chi.
I can't believe that my body has slowed its repairs so much. I have the cardio, the strength, and the endurance. I just can't seem to do more than one workout a day for 5-6x/week at the level I want to do it. I already take a full load of vitamins. I'm already pretty much paleo & protein, very little carbs or sugar (chocolate), lots of fish & fruit. My drinking days are behind me, and I don't even like soda. A frozen yogurt and a half a pizza a week is about the limit of my depravity.
I'm getting "Younger Next Year" back out of the library to see what they say about recovery. (Thai massage? I could live with that.) I'm going to talk to one of the other taekwondo instructors about how they've handled geezers, but this is a young dojang and I'm the oldest one by nearly a decade. Eventually I'll have to tactfully & respectfully inform our enthusiastic instructor that I'll be doing "geezer reps" of his exercises instead of trying to keep up with the younger whippersnappers.
Any other ideas? Am I missing anything else?
Look at it this way; at least you are FI. So, there are compensations for growing older. 
