- Marlene Flowers didn't start bodybuilding until she was in her sixties.
- Now, at 67, she's a fitness influencer and can do 140 push-ups in a row.
- Being patient and having the right mentality have both helped her get fit later in life, she said.
At 57, Marlene Flowers' knees hurt when she walked up and down hills. Now, almost 10 years later, she can leg press over 200 pounds.
Flowers told Business Insider that life has been tough: she was in difficult relationships and has struggled with eating disorders.
In 2015, she had an operation on her colon due to issues caused by her eating disorders. "That's when I realized I had to turn things around and change, because I was destroying my body," she said.
At the age of 58, she started exercising at home, following bodyweight programs on fitness DVDs. As she got stronger, she began incorporating weights into her home workouts and fell in love with lifting weights.
The DVDs quickly became too easy, so Flowers started bodybuilding at home to keep pushing herself.
Flowers wanted to go to the gym to take her workouts to the next level but was worried people would judge a woman of her age. With the encouragement of her son, she overcame her fear and worked out at the gym for the first time at the age of 63.
Now, almost four years after first stepping foot in a gym, she can do 140 push-ups, 25 pull-ups, or 100 sit-ups in one go. She does ab exercises as soon as she wakes up every morning, goes to the gym seven days a week, and is on a "carb-cycling" diet, which she hopes will improve her performance.
Flowers said she will continue lifting weights as long as it makes her feel good.
"I feel so much more self-confident and better about myself. I can look in the mirror and I'm happy with what I see, which is something I couldn't do all my life," she said.
Flowers believes everyone should do something to stay fit. "If you can stay physically fit, you'll be healthier in the long run, live a longer life, and it's great for your mind," she said.
A 2023 study found that older adults often think they can't do resistance training because of mobility issues, fear of hurting themselves, or that age is a barrier to strength. But building and maintaining muscle mass is beneficial for people of any age, partly because it combats the loss of muscle that occurs over time, known as sarcopenia. In the long term, sarcopenia can make it harder to carry out everyday tasks and increase the likelihood of falls.
Plus, a 2022 study found that resistance training was linked to 9% lower risk of dying, rising to 41% when participants also did cardio exercises.
Flowers shared four things she's learned about getting fit at any age.
Mentality is the most important part of getting fit
Flowers said that her determination to get fit was the biggest thing that helped her achieve it.
"You have to have the desire and the drive inside your head and in your heart," she said. "It doesn't matter what you're doing or what your goals are, but you need to get started in order to form a habit."
Experts agree that it takes a lot of repetition to form a habit, and BI's Rachel Hosie previously wrote that you need to build fitness into your lifestyle for it to stick.
Diet is important for muscle growth
Flowers noticed that what she ate had the biggest impact on her body.
"You're not going to grow muscle if you're not eating what you need to eat for your goals," she said, even if you're doing the "perfect" workout.
Jamie Wright, a registered nutritionist, previously told BI that eating lots of protein is important for building muscle and losing belly fat, while adding carbohydrates to meals can provide more energy for workouts.
Don't rush
Progress happens slowly, Flowers found.
"You don't want to overdo it because you can hurt yourself, and then you just put yourself back," she said. "It's taken me quite a bit of time to get to where I am, but with time, persistence, and discipline, you can accomplish anything you put your mind to."
Kristin Haraldsdottir, Ph.D., director of exercise research and innovation for Hydrow, previously told BI that it can take 12 weeks to see the results of strength training to build muscle. She recommended training three times a week and increasing the weight for quicker progress — but taking a full day of rest between workouts.
Embrace community
As well as getting fitter, weightlifting helped Flowers meet the friends she calls her "fit family" at the gym and from being a fitness influencer.
"They are the friends that I didn't have all my life because I was isolated with my husbands and work. I love being part of that group. It's a community. It makes me feel good, and it gives me the confidence to keep going. They are very, very supportive," she said.
Exercising with friends is a great way to motivate yourself because it provides accountability and a source of joy from socializing at the same time as working out, Daniel Lieberman, a Harvard paleoanthropologist and author of a book on exercise, previously told BI.