Transcription
Hello everyone and welcome back to the channel. They say V2 max is the best marker for longevity. They say grip strength is second. But what if I told you they are 1,000% wrong? A brand new study just came out and it proves exactly what I've been saying for a very, very long time. It's not V2 max. It's not grip strength. It's power. Because when you lose your power, it's the beginning of the end. So if you want to stay young, don't just survive, train to strive. Protect your speed, your explosiveness. Why? Because you're not surviving, you're thriving. Let's go into the study.
>> Okay, so here we go. Let's break down the study and what it actually did. Before we talk about the graphs and numbers, you need to know exactly how it was designed. The study, by the way, was published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings in August 2025. It included 3,899 men and women between the ages of 46 and 75. The researchers, what they did, they followed them for an average of about 10.8 years to see who lived and who died. Their goal was very simple: find out which predicts survival better, muscle strength or muscle power. This is what they did.
They used two tests at the beginning of the study. Power was measured using the upper body rowing movement on a machine called vitro or vitro dine. It tracks how fast and how hard each person could pull a weight and then divide that number by their body weight. They call this relative muscle power, RP. As for strength, it was measured using a standard hand grip test known as a dynamometer. They called this relative muscle strength, RSTR. After following these people for over a decade, this is what they found. Men in the lower power group were 5.88 times more likely to die than men in the higher power group. Women in the lower power group were 6.9 times more likely to die than women in the higher power group. In comparison, muscle strength showed only a small difference, about 1.6 to 1.7 times. So, not according to me, according to the study, muscle power was by far a stronger predictor of survival.
Now, I know what some of you might be wondering. What in the world does "5.88 times more likely to die" mean? What does it, what does it mean? So, let me explain it to you in simple language because I even had a hard time. The researchers followed almost 4,000 people for about 11 years, like I mentioned earlier. And here's what they found. If you were in the lower power group, your chance of dying during the study was about six times higher than the people in the higher power group. Now, please bear in mind, this does not mean everybody dropped dead at once. It means that at any point during those 11 years, the people with low power were about six times more likely to die than the people with high power. So if one person died in the high power group, about six people died in the lower power group. That's what 5.88 means. Okay.
Now I would like you to check out this diagram. This is an incredible diagram. They called it "The Determinants of Longevity." And as you can see, they place power right on top. Everything else is downstream. Strength, V2 max, balance, and muscle mass is sitting below muscle power. And this is exactly what I've been saying for years right on this channel. Everything is downstream from power. It is said all over the internet: V2 max is the best predictor of longevity and grip strength is second. And that's what most people believe. But let's compare this fairly. Apples to apples, low versus high. Let's start with grip strength. I'm going to show you a study on this. The lowest 20% were about 2.2 to 2.5 times more likely to die than the strongest people with grip strength. Now, let's talk about V2 max. Going from low to high fitness showed a 3.9 difference in risk. Now, as I mentioned earlier, power, it's going from low to high showed a 5.88 difference in men, a 6.90 difference in women. That's almost triple the grip strength and almost double the impact of V2 max, or at least one and a half times stronger, even on the most conservative side.
Now, before somebody brings this up, I'm going to disclose it because I don't want somebody to say this guy interpreted differently. In the V2 max study, there was also an elite group, and the low versus elite showed a hazard ratio of 5.04. But here's the problem. The power study didn't have an elite group because they basically don't exist at these ages. You can still reach at least V2 max at 60 or 70 because V2 max mostly depends on your slow type one motor units, and these stick around up to the age of 100. So jogging and cycling, you can enhance this. But to have elite power, you need to still have your type 2X motor units, and most people lose these in their 20s. More on this later. That's why there is no elite group in the power study. It's all low to high. That's it. It's not like the V2 max where they use low to high or low to elite. To be fair, when we make the comparison, we must compare apples to apples. So, we must compare low to high on both sides. Even if we compare low to elite with V2 max, power still beats V2 max.
Now, I would like to show you what these scientists recommended, word for word. "It strongly advocates for a greater emphasis on power-oriented training in exercise prescriptions, refining the guidance provided to individuals seeking to optimize their health and extend their lifespan." Now, even the researchers are saying it: stop focusing only on strength, stop focusing only on endurance, and start focusing on power. But here's what they didn't tell you. The part they completely missed. You can't just train for power at any age. Power only exists if your type 2X motor units are still alive. And as I mentioned earlier, they start dying off at the age of 25. And that's what this channel is about: training your fast motor units, the ones everybody ignores until they're gone. People laugh at me when they see me doing zigzags, sprints, hops, spins. They say, "What the heck is this guy doing? Is he crazy?" Well, one thing is certain: the study doesn't laugh, and the study doesn't think I'm crazy.
Ladies and gentlemen, to live the longest, most of what you do should be power and speed. Most people train the so-called 80/20 rule: only 20% high intensity and 80% easy work. I do the complete opposite. I do the 20/80 rule: 80% high power intensity, because power is life. And you must train your entire body to move with speed and power, not just sprints or heavy lifting. Like I said over and over on this channel, chaos and plyception, unpredictable plyometrics and proprioception put together to keep every part of your body powerful. Protect your speed. Protect your power. Because once you lose speed, you lose your youth. Once you lose power, you lose coordination, reflexes, balance. You lose it all. Protect it at all costs. Protect those fast-twitch type 2X motor units. I said it many times. Have a great day. See you in my next.