Workout and Diet Advice for Women over 45

I had to check the date on my LA Times newspaper  –  figured I must have come across an old one I had somehow stashed.    Yes it was definitely 2009, and in the photo the first lady had dark hair and dark skin.  So was I really reading that “many women still believe that if they hoist more than 10-pound dumbbells…… they’ll look as massive as the Incredible Hulk”?  (Who are these women?  If you are out there please contact me.)

I digress – the point of  today’s blog was “What is the obsession with Michelle Obama’s arms?”  I saw the article in the newspaper LA Times Sunday March 29 (Aesthetics) in the Image Section. I read it expecting it to be about all the gyms and fitness trainers inundated with women wanting toned and buffed arms.   So I was shocked to read an article that could have come out of the ‘50s (the 1950s).  Is there really an online forum where the posts are something like “….. Mrs. Obama should be hiding her arms instead of showing them off…”?  I didn’t go looking for it.

I read the article further to find out that there are few people who admire Madonna’s “well-defined build” and that “.. few 50-year-old women look like that”.  That might be true, but in anticipation of looking like that wellafter 50, I registered the domain name “sixpackatsixty” a couple of yeas ago.  Seems it is the time to roll it out.  So I am here to speak for all the very fit, strong, buffed women over 60 (and certainly over 50)  –  we laugh at such inane articles.  Ha!!

[You can follow sixpackatsixty on Twitter; and I plan to blog at least weekly on blog.sixpackatsixty.com]

What was of concern, was the tone of the article – basically around the theme that Women are seen as threatening if they have biceps.  Would be funny if the writer (a woman wrote this….?) wasn’t presenting this mostly one-sided article in all seriousness  –  and in California where we have an ex body-builder (OK he is male) as Governor.

What gets me really angry though is the apologist – a “personal trainer of Gold’s Gym Fitness Institute”.  Here is a person in the fitness industry (one assumes with experience of more than a couple of years) adding criticism of Madonna’s physique rather than celebrating the fact that she can look that great at that age.  One is led to suspect that Ramona is young and perhaps Madonna looks better than Ramona does.  One has to wonder how Gold’s Gym – the body building Mecca – feels about those comments.

More surprises – the Canadian female body-builder who says that  “baring her ripped arms in public never fails to prompt reactions”.  Did anyone think that the stares might be open admiration?  I was a competitive body-builder in Canada (Vancouver) in the ‘80s.  I recall that my achievements influenced a number of younger women to get into body-building.  Now those were early days, yet I do not recall any hostile stares – I got loads of compliments.

In fact I still do.  I am proud of my physique and it is hard work to maintain – especially as I am not as young as Mrs. Obama.  Women still occasionally walk up to me in the gym and tell me I look good.  I have yet to encounter pointing and snickering, and I have been doing this for 25 years.

Thank heavens for people like Janet Lee, editor of Shape magazine, whose quote ends the article “… I’d rather see a million Michelle Obamas”, than women who have no muscle.

Let’s all raise our 15-pound dumbbells to that!