‘Bench-press an elephant’
With four practitioners of fitness and well-being all singing from the same hymn sheet, what do the medical
professionals say? Dr. Iqbal Malik, a medical director of OneWelbeck Heart Health in Marylebone, warns against going
straight from indolence to the kind of regimes our interviewees so far have been practising for years. “It’s never a
bad time to start getting fitter, but if you try to bench-press an elephant from the outset, you’re going to break
your arms,” he says. “You’ve got to work it up gradually. You’re not going to go from couch potato to Olympic squash
player. Make sure you can walk, then jog, then run, then you might be able to do the more intense sports. Otherwise,
being shown up by the local club squash champion is not a good look. Build up gradually, and rather than doing
enormous amounts of activity once a week, do activities two or three times a week to keep the engine tuned, then try
some extreme, eyeball-busting levels of exercise when you’ve been exercising regularly for a year.”
Dr. Natasha Beach, of OneWelbeck’s Orthopaedics, says that strength training at least once a week will help prevent
the rubber-band-snap her colleague Malik refers to, adding that those of us of a certain vintage (those, let’s say,
who can remember when the word ‘gym’ meant the stuffy-smelling room with wall-bars at the back of the school) should
bear in mind key myths on the subject of late-onset fitness instincts. She says: “‘I’m too old to take up a new
sport’ is untrue, as are ‘I have arthritis so I shouldn’t run’ and ‘Doing sport will make me more likely to get
arthritis’. We actually prescribe exercise for patients to help reduce pain and stiffness, increase muscle strength,
and improve joint mobility.”
Like Malik, Beach recommends taking it slowly (“big jumps in the amount of activity you’re doing is a common reason
for developing an injury”), splashing out for the right gear (“running shoes with a gait analysis, a racket with the
right grip”), and, above all, physiological self-awareness. “Listen to your body,” she says. “If you think you have
an injury, ease off for a few days and see how it feels. If it persists, get it checked out.”
As Managing Director of Lanserhof at the Arts Club, and with more than 25 years’ experience in leadership roles at
prestigious private members’ clubs, Mario Pederzolli knows a thing or two about the options available to new
wellness warriors. And while insisting that acceptance of ageing should be the foundation of one’s approach — “The
ageing process is like the tide and taxes,” he says — modern know-how means that the habit of seeking expert
consultations only when our health lets us down should be consigned to history. “The pandemic has certainly focused
all our minds on taking responsibility for our well-being — we’ve seen a significant shift towards proactive health
screenings and preventative health,” he says. “Preventative medicine is becoming increasingly personalised —
accurate diagnostics are key in creating effective and targeted bespoke programmes.”
Personalised, blood-test-based vitamin and mineral supplementation, biomechanical analysis, rehabilitation, injury
prevention and sport and exercise science should all be in the mix, he says, adding that, conversely, these should
be supplemented with simple day-to-day measures that anyone can introduce to their lives in a heartbeat. “Posture is
a common complaint as we age — osteoporosis-related stooping or leaning forwards is often due to weakening muscles
and a fear of instability,” he says. “To combat this, try to avoid sitting down too much — it truly is the new
smoking! Also, how we eat is just as important as what we eat. Each bite should be savoured and chewed for at least
30 seconds. You should also leave at least four hours between meals to aid digestion, and avoid drinking anything
while you are eating. It’s also a great idea to incorporate fasting into your weekly routine to encourage cell
renewal and help your gut microbiome to thrive, and ensure you’re incorporating as many anti-inflammatory foods —
berries, green tea, extra virgin olive oil — into your diet as possible.”
Unsurprisingly, Pederzolli’s is another voice in the chorus that advocates good mental health as a prop for solid
physical health: “Stress can be a lifestyle choice. Our awareness of ourselves in our current life situation is the
first step to building resilience — knowing who we are and, in particular, not comparing ourselves to others.
Embracing and accepting the ageing process will also promote inner happiness. As we enter middle age, memories of
our youth are heightened — our first love, our first car, our first job... This is known as the ‘reminiscence bump’.
What about creating our second reminiscence bump? Leaving the job we don’t like, travelling more, breaking free of
relationships that no longer work. Remember, it’s never too late for change.”
‘Age cannot wither her’
Pederzolli won’t be getting any argument from the eldest of those The Rake consulted for this treatise: 78-year-old
model and photographer Jill Kennington, who appeared in Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1966 film, Blow-Up. She is someone
who, in her own words, “was still charging around at 48 and still charging around at 70”, although poor health last
year has (temporarily, we’re sure) slowed her down for now.
Kennington — who, in her capacity as a photographer, once collaborated on a book with the actress Harriet Walter
inspired by a line from Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra, “Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite
variety” — is a great believer that life experience, and the empathy and existential appreciation that come with it,
are the nearest thing that exists to an elixir of youth. “I’m not somebody who wants to change nature’s course,” she
tells The Rake. “Look at other animals and how endearing they become as they become old — we’re the same.”
Life-enriching experiences, Kennington says — in her case the likes of photoshoots in locations (including the North
Pole) only a fraction of humanity will ever visit — have given her the kind of youthful vitality that could never be
found in a bottle. Then there’s the stuff closer to home: “I never really had a fitness regime, but I’ve always been
a complete nature lover, and that takes me out on two big walks a day with my dogs, if I’m not on a job,” she says.
“If anything is going wrong in life, a walk and some time sat on a log looking at the moss and hearing birdsong just
levels you out. That’s always been my health regime. If you go out in the morning and there’s dew on the ground, and
you put your hands in it, put the dew on your face, breathe in, look at the trees — it’s gorgeous. It’s meditation
and mindfulness, years before those things were so popular in the west.”
Given the clear synergy between health and happiness, the exchanging of one’s soul for youth — so common a theme in
literature — is clearly a self-defeating approach.
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