Fitness, Reserve, and the Long Game

Why Staying 20 Years Ahead of Disease Is the Only Strategy That Works

Read this First — Busy-reader summary

Ageing is not a smooth, inevitable slide. It happens through hidden tipping points, where fitness and reserve quietly erode until one illness, fall, or stressor triggers sudden decline. From around age 30, most people lose about 1 percent per year of physical capacity unless they actively defend it. Over decades, this compounds into major losses of strength, aerobic fitness, balance, recovery ability, and independence. Fitness is not about peak performance. It is reserve — the ability to live a good day of life while retaining enough margin to cope with the unexpected without tipping into frailty. Real-world data from Masters sport shows participation collapsing beyond the mid-60s, not from loss of interest, but from loss of capacity. The same biology drives falls, fractures, hospital admissions, dementia, and loss of independence in the wider population. Only about 10 percent of ageing is genetic. Around 90 percent is shaped by long-term choices around movement, nourishment, sleep, stress, recovery, learning, and lifestyle. The Freeranger approach is simple but demanding: stay twenty years ahead of disease. Build capacity early, defend it relentlessly, and stay well away from physiological thresholds. Waiting for symptoms is a losing strategy.

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Introduction

I want to start on a positive note, because this is not an article about fear, decline, or inevitability. It is about foresight, personal agency, and intelligent investment.

The human body is not fragile by design. It is adaptive, resilient, and capable of remarkable longevity when it is used, nourished, and respected. Ageing is real, but how we age is far more negotiable than most people have been led to believe.

With a Freerangers mindset, we work from one central principle:

Stay twenty years ahead of disease.

Not ten years behind it, reacting once something breaks, but decades ahead of it, quietly building capacity, resilience, and reserve long before trouble appears.

This article is a continuation of the article Nourishment, Mitochondria, Muscle, and the Long Game of Health. It was written to respond to the positive feedback and thoughtful questions that followed. Many readers understood the foundations and asked the next, more important question:

"How does this actually play out across a lifetime?"

This article answers that question.

What Fitness Really Means

Fitness is often misunderstood. It is not about looking athletic, chasing medals, or grinding yourself into exhaustion. True fitness is the ability to meet the ordinary physical, mental, and emotional demands of daily life with ease, while retaining sufficient reserve to cope with the unexpected without tipping into decline. That reserve is everything.

It is what allows you to recover from illness rather than spiral into frailty. It is what allows you to survive a fall, an infection, or a so-called minor medical event. It is what keeps you independent when life inevitably lands a blow.

As we age, fitness stops being about peak performance and becomes about survivability.

The Long, Slow Arc of Decline: The One Percent Rule

There is a long-accepted rule of thumb in exercise physiology that from around the age of thirty, the average person loses about one percent per year of overall physical capacity if they do nothing to defend it actively.

This includes aerobic capacity, strength, power, recovery, agility, balance, coordination, and physiological reserve.

One percent sounds trivial. Over decades, it is not.

If we apply simple compounding decline (the following calculation have been made with the help of AI):

• At age 50 (20 years after 30):0.99²⁰ ≈ 0.82This is an 18 percent loss of capacity.

• At age 100 (70 years after 30):0.99⁷⁰ ≈ 0.50This is roughly a 50 percent loss of capacity.

Let's talk about aerobic fitness. Oxygen consumption (VO2 max) is one of the best ways to predict survival and independence.

VO₂ Max Calculations: What the Numbers Mean

A commonly cited average VO₂ max for a healthy adult male or female around age 30 is roughly 35 ml/kg/min. Applying the one-percent decline rule:

• At age 50:35 × 0.82 ≈ 28.7 ml/kg/min

• At age 100:35 × 0.50 ≈ 17.5 ml/kg/min

Now introduce a critical physiological reality. A VO₂ max of around 15 ml/kg/min is often cited as the lower threshold for sustaining independent life. Below this level, the ability to perform basic daily tasks, recover from illness, and remain autonomous becomes extremely limited.

On paper, someone starting at 35 ml/kg/min could remain above this threshold even at very advanced age.

But this is where theory and real-life part company, and you will understand why very few people ever break the ton.

Why Thresholds Are Not Safety Nets

Being just above a threshold is not safe. It is extremely precarious.

A person hovering above 15 ml/kg/min may just cope on a good day, but one dose of flu — even a bad cold, pneumonia, COVID, gastro, a fall with a fracture, a "minor" heart attack or stroke, or even a week in bed can cause a sharp drop in aerobic capacity, muscle mass, balance, and confidence.

That drop may be temporary, or it may become permanent because recovery is incomplete.

If reserve was already low, that single event could push the person well below the critical threshold. Frailty sets in. Independence is lost. Premature death often follows quietly, not dramatically.

This is why the Freeranger goal is not to stay above the line, but to stay well away from it.

The Power of Starting Higher: Reserve Changes Everything

Let's look at what happens as a person becomes older but has more aerobic capacity. Of course, they still end up with less aerobic capacity, but they are keeping a better safety margin.

Scenario 1: VO₂ max of 45 ml/kg/min at age 30

• Age 50:45 × 0.82 ≈ 36.9 ml/kg/min

• Age 100:45 × 0.50 ≈ 22.5 ml/kg/min

This person has far more buffer. They can absorb illness, injury, or stress and remain functional. They are much more likely to enjoy their old age and to make 100 years.

Scenario 2: VO₂ max of 55 ml/kg/min at age 30

• Age 50:55 × 0.82 ≈ 45.1 ml/kg/min

• Age 100:55 × 0.50 ≈ 27.5 ml/kg/min

These numbers are not predictions of lifespan, but they sure do help. They are illustrations of the margin later in life by starting with a higher capacity and strategising to maintain it for longer.

Two people can decline at the same rate and end up in completely different places. One ends up living precariously near the edge. The other carries a wide safety buffer for decades, if not for life.

This is why investing early changes everything.

Tipping Points: Why Decline Is Not Linear

Ageing is not a smooth, linear slide. It is a series of comfortable plateaus.

Life feels fine. Nothing seems obviously wrong. But underneath, reserve is quietly eroding.

It is like sitting on a chair and slowly tipping backward. For a long time, nothing happened. Then suddenly, instability replaces stability and you are flat on your back on the floor, wondering what just happened.

That is how ageing catches people out.

Staying twenty years ahead of disease anticipates these tipping points and avoids them by ensuring there is always enough fitness, reserve, and preventive strategy in place.

What Masters MTB Data Shows Us in the Real World

Theory is useful. Real-world data is better. I've decided to go to the March 2026 UCI Masters Mountain Bike World Championships (XCO), in Chile because our daughter, Mary-Ann has entered. For me, this competition will represent almost 10 years unbeaten in these events. Looking at the entries is sobering from an ageing perspective.

Early entry numbers for the 2026 UCI Masters Mountain Bike World Championships (XCO), grouped in five-year age bands from 55 onward, look like this:

• 55–59: 70 competitors

• 60–64: 45 competitors

• 65–69: 23 competitors

• 70–74: 9 competitors (my category)

• 75+: 0 competitors

This is not a gentle slope. It is an accelerating cliff. Participation roughly halves with each five-year age band. By the early seventies, numbers had collapsed to single digits. Beyond seventy-five, there are presently none. This is not a loss of interest. It is a loss of capacity.

Masters' sport simply reveals what is happening across the wider population. The same biological forces driving this collapse in participation are driving falls, fractures, hospital admissions, cognitive decline, and loss of independence in everyday life.

Sport is the canary in the coal mine.

This Applies to Everyone, Not Just Athletes

These patterns are not unique to competitors. They apply to the entire population.

There will always be statistical outliers. Some people age rapidly. Others age remarkably slowly. But here is the crucial point:

Genetics determine only around 10 percent of health and longevity. The remaining 90 percent are shaped by choices made over decades, including:

• Nutrition quality

• Muscle and strength maintenance

• Daily movement and cardiovascular fitness

• Sleep and recovery

• Stress exposure and management

• Toxic load from chemicals and pollutants

• Unnecessary medications and medical interventions

• Social connection, purpose, and meaning

Most of what determines how we age is modifiable. Those who remain strong into their seventies and beyond are not lucky. They invested early and consistently.

Why Waiting for Disease Is a Losing Strategy

Modern healthcare is built around reaction. When the disease is diagnosed, the underlying processes may have been growing quietly for ten, twenty, or even thirty years. Heart disease, dementia, diabetes, arthritis, osteoporosis, and cancer do not arrive overnight.

If you wait for symptoms, you are already behind the curve. That is why the Freeranger approach is proactive, not reactive. We do not wait for pain.We do not wait for abnormal blood tests. We do not wait for a loss of mobility or confidence. We invest forward.

The Freeranger Path

A Freeranger does not train to scrape by. A Freeranger trains for resilience:

• We build capacity early.

• We defend it relentlessly.

• We accept ageing, but we refuse fragility.

Fitness, in this sense, is not about how you perform on your best day. It is about how well you cope at your worst.

By staying twenty years ahead of disease, we widen the funnel instead of being crushed by it. We maintain independence, protect dignity, and dramatically improve our odds of living long, capable, meaningful lives.

That is not anti-ageing fantasy.That is intelligent preparation.That is the Freeranger way.

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Disclaimer

You should not use the information on this site for diagnosis or treatment of any health problem or for prescription of any medication or other treatment. You should consult with a healthcare professional before starting any diet, exercise, or supplementation program, before taking any medication, or if you have or suspect you might have a health problem. You are solely responsible for doing your own research on any information provided. This information should not substitute professional advice. Individual results may vary. Database references herein are not all-inclusive. Getting well from reading or using the information contained herein is purely coincidental.

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