I became more tired all the time.Injuries took more time to heal.Female triathletes stopped wanting to sleep with me.

My solution

I make myself get a lot more rest,take it all it less seriously and stopped spending money on fast gear and fast women.

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Most of the top guys that raced in 40-44 and 45-49 when I was in those age groups did not lose any speed during their 40s. Some are now still knocking out good times in their 50s.

Unless you were really fast in your 30’s you should still be able to improve into your late 40’s. The big keys will be staying healthy and motivated to improve. I turned 49 this year and have run my fastest times this year including a 2:40 marathon in December. I didn’t start my endurance sport journey until I was 38 so have been steadily improving since then. Still have the motivation to push my self hard as I really want to run a sub 2:40 marathon. I know the decline is just around the corner for me, and am also worried how I will handle it if I know I won’t have a chance to set a PR in a race.

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Let food be thy medicine...

I started to fall apart at 50.
I was at my fittest and least slow at 48 or 49.
Long period anaemic when 50 fooked most of a year. Subsequent Lost flexibility (not doing enough when ill) has hampered the following couple.
Definitely a use it or lose it scenario.

But my swimming is still improving and the long distances getting longer. 2.4 mile on an IM is hardly enough to get properly loosened up these days ! So it's not all totally downhill even in the mid 50s !

I was training hard, smoking my age group, and still getting some overall podiums into my early 50’s. Long story short, After blowing up at 58, I realized that I was still trying to maintain my times… despite hurting more, perceived effort increasing, injuries, and longer recoveries. I had to totally regroup, and had to throw out time expectations and goals. I went back to training by feel, with the same perceived effort I had come to know and love for the previous 40 years… and just let my times fall where they may. I’m living the inverse of the old saying: It never stops hurting, you just get faster. My new saying is: It still feels the same, you just get slower.

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Athlinks / Strava

Good question. I was actually going to post something like “When did you start feeling your age?”.

55 now. Bad knees so cannot run. Still riding and swimming on par from my 30s but definitely takes way longer to recover from those efforts but I also feel like I’m close to going off a cliff times wise…

43? Y'er still a babe.

I'm 54 and still *feel* young---and can train pretty hard when I want to. You have plenty of time left to improve and actually get faster. At 51, I lost a local 10km to two 27 year-olds.

Everyone is different, of course, but the consensus from similar threads over the last several years seems to land somewhere around late 50s that true unilateral decline begins (some sooner, some later)---notwithstanding injuries, or disease. By 60, most everyone seems to report no longer being able to hold on to the past, in spite of remaining healthy.

I was not going to respond to this because it comes quite often. But there is another side that some may find interesting. Never been super fast but held my own. In my 50’s started podium, also got to Kona but pretty much racing the same time wise. In my 60’s and 70’s podium all the time and got to Kona’s a bunch of times not really slowing down well maybe some. But the age groups started getting smaller and a lot of DNF’s. Past 75 I changed the way I trained not being concerned about speed and more on endurance. Over 80 finished Kona last year and I have a big engine and you are going to need it if you want to continue to race long course at this age. I had problems in 2 places at 2022 Kona with out the endurance my day would have been over. Still got some speed but it comes from endurance training.

I'm 44, so similar age. I always thought I didn't need to do any strength work - swimming, biking, and running provided sport specific strength. Over the last couple of years I've learned that just basic body weight and mobility exercises on a daily basis can go a long way.

Biking has stayed the same with my FTP being pretty consistent over the years, but I do ride a lot (10-11k miles most years). Running is harder to hold on to, but with doing strength work I've been able to retain most of my speed across all distances. Swimming is also pretty consistent (when I swim consistently!).

Another thing is that you need to make the easy days really, really, really easy to make the harder days pay dividends fitness wise. I've found this especially true for running. I can still crank out reasonably fast intervals on the track, but I need to surround those days with real easy ones to make the hard days count.

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Too many variables to answer your question. Are you talking about sprints and olympic distance? Or Ironman? How much have you put into racing? Were you all in? Years of Masters swim and track workouts? Massage therapist and PT sessions?

If you were “all in” and doing short distance, yup you top end stuff is done. There may be endurance to pick up?
If you did triathlon as a sport for fun and fitness, you may have both speed and endurance to pick up. I have done triathlon since ‘81. Ironman since ‘82, but I was a teacher and spent more time working than working out. A year after I retired at age 60 I did my fastest Ironman (yes, ideal conditions on an easy course).
Like the pros, your speed will decrease for short stuff by 35ish and Ironman by early 40’s if you were “all in”.
There will always be another age group with damn tough competitors! Enjoy the sport!
Or give up and play golf😂😂😂

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Team Zoot So Cal

I started running competitively in HS and haven't stopped competing since then, starting tris in my mid 20s. I'm 63. My current 5K run race pace is slower than my PR marathon pace. Why do I continue to race? Because I still enjoy testing my limits.

similar for me. i'm in my late 50s and have raced running events since 1975 and trained hard since my early teens. From my late 30s through to late 40s it seemed the pack was constantly getting shuffled as some started declining a bit earlier and/or faster than others, and some of those who started running later in life were even improving. In my case i didn't lose much over 5K until about 43 or 44; then was a minute slower by 48, and another minute slower by 52 or 53. Some of that is due to no longer being able to do track intervals without injuring something.

Cycling is the complete opposite. Started at 41 with a lot of fitness and no specific skills, and 16 years later i think i am a much better cyclist, and haven't really lost any power. i think that is pretty normal. i am not bad on the bike, but at no time in my life would i have been good enough to win the state 60-65 TT champs.....there are a lot of cyclists who don't seem to lose much as they age. i also think cycling is a sport that it helps to be "retired" ...which may contribute to the performance of those 60+ year olds. Running....not so much.

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And the question remains. where were you.

I'm 63. My current 5K run race pace is slower than my PR marathon pace. Why do I continue to race? Because I still enjoy testing my limits. //

Ha, wait until you are 67, I would have to train very hard for at least 5 weeks to maybe do one mile of my marathon PR pace when I was 38!! That is where the wheels have come off the most, running. Could also just be that it is the one sport I neglect, but also do that with biking, and that comes back much faster, and better. There was a time that I couldn't run a 9 minute mile, it was just too dam slow. Now it is the pace I have to train for, and eventually try and hold for my runs of 3 miles, what the hell happened to us!


I suppose if I ran at least 15 miles a week for a few months, with a few 20+ ones in there, I might still have a 21 or so 5k in me. Just seems like a lot of work and potential injury for little glory. But the new swim run races have sort of motivated me to get back at it regularly, not just a crash course 6 weeks before the races...

I'm running more miles now (averaging about 38 mpw) than I have in the past 35+ years. It helps that I quit swimming & cycling (except for 3 or 4 sprint tris each summer) when the pandemic began and haven't started back up yet.

I've been doing this since 1990 and since reaching 52 / 53 my times have dropped off a cliff.

Last year I decided to try and hit a 5k run target and after a couple of misses, I eventually made it - but it was hard work and still more than a minute slower than the time I had done 6 years before. I'm retired and have time to do a lot of training if I want to - but I definitely cannot push myself like I used to.

I'm glad I can still swim, bike and run - but it's totally for enjoyment now. I do have a half marathon in 6 weeks time and I'll be interested to see how that goes.......

At 43 I still had my fastest times ahead of me since I really didn’t start racing and training until my 30 s. It’s the short stuff that I’ll never come close to again and that’s kinda depressing , however, at age 66 I’m looking for a PR at Boston this spring. And I’m pretty sure I can still come close to my early years half and full distance tri times. Those times weren’t very impressive in my 40s but now they consistently get me on the podium in my current age group.

I'm 61 now and still have my run. I do not manage 1:30 anymore in a half marathon, but did a 1:33:36 last year. Last year in Kona I ran 3:50, which was the 4th time in the m60. The fastest time was 3:43. I had 2 kg overweight last year (BMI 25,4) compared to other years because of a slight motivation lack due to all uncertanties during the pandemic. So without those kilos I even could have had the fastest time!

So hardly any decline in running although I neglect my running training, giving more focus to my weaker disciplines swimming and biking.

Every year I'm surprised it still goes and I'm looking forward to see how it will go this year. One goal is to loose some weight and get back to 84 or 85 kilos again.

42 is no age to use as an excuse for slowing down! Consistent focused training will still pay dividends and, unless you were a top age grouper previously you could easily improve not slow down. In my 50’s I’ve set PB’s for full and half, including 9.27 full age 56. All my cycle TT PB’s have been set as a vet 50 or 55.
Yes injuries will probably happen more often and take longer to heal, you be a bit more tired…but just get more rest. You might need to look closely at diet to get the best out of your body and, perhaps most importantly (and not very popular) if you drink alcohol cut right back or give it up!

It depends on the event and when you started. If for instance you are talking about the marathon, it takes about 10 to 12 years to build your endurance and run your best. I know people who started in their early 20s and peaked in their early 30s and some who started in their early 60s and peaked in their early 70s.

The formula as you age is to be aware of rest, diet, consistency and mobility to be able to perform your best. The one factor that surprised me as I went thru my late 50s/ early 60s was genetics. You can’t fight what your mom and dad handed to you and things like heart, hips, knees, colon, etc…..have to be watched and managed to continue to move into your 70s and beyond to be successful in your journey.

I would say in your early 40s is a good time to start being aware of your goals and figuring out how to extend your journey and not to start shutting down.

3:50 at 90 kegs at 61!!!

That is fantastic. I am happy for you

Not too happy for me. I am running (pun) out of excuses why I run so slow

Lol

I'll add my 55 year old slowing down experiences but first ask a question:
is anything slowing down your old human decline??

my experiences: i am a cyclist first and run mostly for the dog (and my bone density). i first noticed not being able to hit peak numbers as consistently at 45. basically the next 5 years were more attention to detail to hit peak numbers for shorter periods of time. after 50 (the last 5 years) - my peak numbers are getting lower and my winter numbers are much lower than the few weeks every summer where i hit peak numbers again.

what i'm doing about it: nothing has been terribly effective that I can tell. I started lifting at 49. that did and still does seem to help holding spiky power from 30 secs to about 2 minutes. I think it also helps have better ability when tired late in a ride.
i have started stretching with more and more regularity to try to increase hip mobility mostly to address low back pain, but... i'm also hoping that better hip mobility might let me get more out of the cycling ability i still have (?!?). my hip mobility is terrible. my attempt at the 90/90 hip stretch is embarrassing. no way i can do that stretch and sit up.

as others have said - my running is significantly worse at 55 than the one year I coached our distance guys in high school winter track and ran with them at 43. i don't run enough that i care too much about that - but just my anecdote that running has declined much more than cycling.

as to original poster. as a LONG-time cyclist (since I was 22) before I hit 43 - 43-45 were still peak performance years.

In my coaching and racing experience at the pointy end over the last few decades it seems that run times start to slow some, not much around 40. Then you see a slow slide again ~ 45. Then again at 50.

S & B times have stayed about the same though and after 55 run times really drop off.

I have seen older athletes get faster on the bike into their 50s, some of that is from retiring, no kids at home, divorce, working less hours. Rarely see swim times get better but then rarely do you see people make that commitment.

Father Time is not kind to older athletes on the run though.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Congrats on your impressive run splits! When did you start competing? What were your running times then?

I’m 63 my Cycling is still ok sub hour for a 25 mile TTs 5K Swimming races are in the region of 1 hr 15 to 20, I do more weight training now although can’t really say I love it, running forget it, it was always my worst of the 3, however I have to watch how much I do now, get some days when my mind wants to do stuff and my body says not a chance ha still love it all though