Biological Age - Are you aging at an accelerated rate?

Most people believe that their age is today’s date minus the date of their birth. That’s called chronological age and it is a fixed calculation - you cannot change it.

But science is emerging that suggests your biological age is a better indicator of how fast you are aging. And most people aren’t going to like the answer.

So what is biological age?

Biological age is a calculation of how well your mind, body and cells perform and function. Biological age is variable and can change based on your lifestyle choices.

Testing biological age gives you an “under the hood” picture of your health to see where are aging faster or slower than the calendar. By knowing your biological age, you can make changes to your lifestyle and over time slow down your aging process.

Why Biological Age Matters

Biological age testing can help you improve your healthspan - the quality of your years - as well as your lifespan - how many years you will live.

If you could live the rest of your days performing at a high level, fully functional, full of energy and vitality…you would have a high healthspan. And with a high healthspan, the desire for a longer lifespan increases.

You want your “curve” to be as high as possible (healthspan) and go as far to the right as possible (lifespan). Here is how we illustrate our objective at Argent Alpha:

One of the biggest factors impacting healthspan (and biological age) is how much body fat you carry.

The more body fat you carry, the more likely your biological age is higher than your chronological age. And with 77% of Men Over 50 being overweight or obese, we have a population of Men aging much faster than they realize.In fact, there are numerous studies that show obesity has been linked to accelerated epigenetic aging in adults. For men, if your body fat is over 25% (the point at which you are considered obese), you are more than likely aging at an accelerated rate.

Methods of Testing

Telomere testing - Mixed reviews on this type of testing. Still evolving and expensive, inconsistent and questionable predictive power. Not recommended…yet. Super interesting area to pay attention to. Stay tuned.

Blood Algorithms - lower cost, simple and a good place to start. You take a blood test, see where you need to make changes in your lifestyle/diet/supplements, implement changes and retest later. Simple and more accurate than new methods that are not fully proven.

Miscellaneous Testing - some new tests are coming to the market that focus on cellular NAD levels, gut microbiome, and sugar molecules (Glycans). All are separate tests that might be beneficial if you want to do a deeper dive into a specific area but not recommended as a place to start.

Epigenetic Methylation - Epigenetics is the study of how lifestyle “activates” and “deactivates” your genes which means you have some control over how your genes impact your health. Considered the “gold standard” of biological age testing, there are numerous companies and methods for this type of test including tests called Horvath, Hannum and DunedinPace. These tests go by various brand names.

Where To Start

If you are curious and want to make a low cost investment in biological age testing, start with Thorne’s biological age test. At only $95, you get an in depth analysis of your overall biological age and information on specific organs and systems.

You purchase the test, set up an account, take a health questionnaire and schedule your blood draw. I got my results back in 3 days so the turn around is quick. At Argent Alpha, we perform this test 1-2 times a year.

If you want to invest a bit more, consider the TruDiagnostic TruAge test. The TruAge test is more comprehensive, more expensive and takes longer to receive results than the Thorne test but is considered to be highly accurate with more specific guidance on improving your biological age.

What We Are Finding

While our sample size at Argent Alpha is small, here is what we are finding after 10 months of results:* Men who have body fat 25% or greater have higher biological ages (accelerated aging).* Men who have body fat 15% or less have lower biological ages (slower aging).* Men who reduce their body fat % and retest biological age have lowered their biological age.It is safe to say that body fat and biological age are correlated. It's why improved body composition is a key metric we measure for helping men become Harder To Kill.

Summary

Understanding the drivers of biological age can help you make lifestyle changes which could slow down your aging, effectively giving you higher quality years and potentially more of them. A simple test gives you a lot of information that you can use to make improvements to your overall health and wellness routine and become Harder To Kill.

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share this with 3 Men over 50 who you think might be interested in becoming Harder To Kill. Thank you!

We oversubscribed our Q4 program called The Argent Alpha Upgrade. If you want to join our waitlist, drop me an email at [email protected]. We will be launching a new cohort December 5, 2023 with applications closing on November 22, 2023. Seats are limited to 15 and 7 are filled as of the date of this newsletter.

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