Muscle Loss After 50: I Used to Bench Press 100kg — Now I Can't Carry Groceries
Last summer, I carried four grocery bags from my car to the kitchen. Two in each hand. Maybe 8 kilograms total. By the time I set them on the counter, my arms were shaking. Not sore. Shaking. Like I'd just finished a workout. Except I hadn't worked out. I'd carried groceries for 30 meters. I stood in my kitchen, staring at my trembling hands, and thought: I used to bench press 100 kilograms. Not a hundred years ago. Not in some distant previous life. In my twenties and thirties, as a professional baseball player, I pressed 100 kilograms for reps. I did lat pulldowns with the full stack. I threw fastballs that required explosive full-body power. My body was a machine built for force. Now that machine couldn't carry groceries without shaking. I went to my doctor the following week and asked for a body composition scan (체성분 검사, cheseongbun geomsa). The results were brutal. At age 57, I had lost approximately 30 percent of the muscle mass I'd had at 30. Thirty percent...