Best Food and Exercise for your Age Group

By Madison De Silva

March, 2023

Health and fitness are essential to achieving a high quality of life. When you feel your best, you look your best and do your best work. Healthy living looks different at different ages. This article is a guideline as to what forms of exercise you should look into in order to be your best self.

0-18 Years Old

In your youth, you should focus on creating healthy habits to set yourself up for a healthy future. For young children, we recommend introducing unfamiliar textures and flavours in their foods to broaden their palette. Make sure your child eats from all food groups and has a well-rounded diet. An active lifestyle is also essential to a child's health. Therefore we recommend enrolling them in a sport they enjoy and allowing them time to explore and have active play with their friends. Teens should focus on creating a well-rounded diet for themselves. Parents should also instill basic cooking skills into their teens to allow them to continue their healthy eating habits when they move out. The teen years are when one's active living tends to decline. Teens stop playing games such as tag, or hide and seek and begin adopting a more sedentary lifestyle. During this time it is important to try and keep active. We recommend trying team sports, swimming, bike riding and in later teen years, a gym membership.

19 - 30 Years Old

During these years your body is at its peak health. During this point in your life, you have a short recovery time. Therefore we recommend doing some form of exercise daily. People in this age range often strive towards achieving a fitness goal. It is important to do so safely. Below we have listed a recommendation based on your fitness goal:

Lose weight:Eat a slight calorie deficit. Look for protein, vegetables and healthy carbs. Do cardio daily (even if it's just going on a walk), weight train 3 times a week, and stretch after your workout to prevent injury.

Gain weight and muscle: Eat in a slight calorie surplus. Look for protein, healthy fats and healthy carbs. Limit your cardio to a quick pre-workout warm-up, weight train 3 times a week (make sure to train a different muscle group each day), and stretch after your workout to prevent injury.

30 - 50 Years Old

Once you hit your 30s your muscle mass and strength begin to decline. It is for this reason that eating foods which build muscle such as protein and healthy cards is essential. People in this age range lose strength before they lose muscle therefore strength training (lifting weights, banded exercise) is important to slow this process. It is also important to incorporate cardio into your workout routine to maintain the health of your cardiovascular system. Lastly stretching is important to keep yourself flexible and prevent injury. We recommend you work out 6 times a week. Warm up with cardio, make strength training the main part of your workout then cool down with some stretching.

50+ Years Old

During this time you want to ease the stress on your joints and focus on exercises that will maintain your health and independence. This means joint-friendly cardio such as walks, water aerobics, and swimming. Joint friendly strength training in the form of bodyweight exercises such as push-ups and squats. It is also more important than ever to train flexibility through pilates and yoga. Nutrition wise, often doctors may have recommended you eat a certain way based on an issue you have presented to them. It is best to follow their instructions. Otherwise, eating a well-rounded diet with healthy carbs will be best.