Executive Summary: Healthy Diet v Dietary Supplementation: improving physical fitness and quality of life in older people

Older people have the greatest barriers (mostly in terms of ability/opportunity) to participating in exercise, and thus have the highest incidence of decreased ease in carrying out tasks of daily living. In an ageing society, the negative effects of age on skeletal muscle performance would be reduced if compliance to exercise regimens could be encouraged through simple advice on timing, duration, frequency, intensity, as well as appropriate nutritional interventions. Research into the impact of optimal nutrition/diet supplementation in young and/or athletic populations is extensive. Such data are scarce when considering healthy, older populations. We therefore propose to investigate the impact of healthy eating habits with or without supplementation, on exercise responsiveness. This protocol seeks to maximise training benefits on the neural muscular and tendinous complexes.