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Exercise Physiologists Swear by a Brutal 1970s Training Blueprint That Helps Men Over 40 Reverse Aging

By Greg Presto Men's Journal

Updated June 3, 2026 5:49 PM

In seven weeks, Jason Minahan increased his life expectancy by 315 days. To do it, the 45-year-old didn't quit smoking. He didn't start taking a thousand supplements, sit under a red light at night, or start getting blood transfusions from a younger guy. He didn't switch to a Volvo to reduce his chance of a fatal car accident. He just did an absolute shitload of intense cardio: Six times per week, 45 minutes per day.

"My calves and ankles would lock up after a mile at first," Minahan says of the nearly two months of workouts. "But because it's cardio and not strength, you're not really super sore or super smoked for the rest of the day."

The high-intensity, high-volume cardio regimen Minahan did over that two-month period was an adjusted version of the "Hickson protocol," probably the most dastardly cardio program ever devised. The study that birthed it-and Minahan's similar regimen-turbocharged VO2 Max, a key measure of fitness that you've probably heard touted during the longevity craze that's swept the world of fitness in the past few years.

Why Oxygen Efficiency Is the Ultimate Mortality Predictor

When you use your muscles, they need oxygen to make fuel. Oxygen from your bloodstream goes into muscle cells, where organelles called mitochondria use it to make adenosine triphosphate, or ATP, which is basically muscle fuel for contraction. Your VO2 Max represents the peak (the max) volume (V) of oxygen (O2) that your muscles can use at once: It's the upper limit of your body's ability to grab that oxygen from your blood and use it. And when that upper limit is higher, you're not just fitter, but you live longer. Large-scale studies have shown that people with VO2 Maxes are less likely to die of cardiovascular disease and have longer lives in general.

For guys, every increase of one unit on the VO2 Max scale could improve life expectancy by 45 days, according to results from a study that followed 5,000 men over 46 years. So if you boost yours by 10 points, you'll add more than a year (450 days) to your life expectancy.

If you're not already at your peak personal fitness, that's a result that's within reach, says Martin Gibala, Ph.D., a professor of kinesiology at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. But, he says, it's going to take some serious work-specifically, vigorous work, the kind Gibala studies in his research on interval training and high-intensity, short bursts of work called "exercise snacks."

Here's how you can unlock more oxygen-and more years of life-for yourself, with details on Minahan's protocol, the science of increasing your VO2 Max, and advice from Gibala and Minahan's coach, Mike Nelson, Ph.D., adjunct professor at the Carrick Institute and founder of Extreme Human Performance.

To Improve Your Max, You've Got to Work at Your Max

When Minahan started his training regimen, his goal wasn't to improve VO2 numbers on a test. It was to finish an upcoming bike race: The Heart of Gold Gravel race in Nevada City, California, a 74-mile course through the Tahoe National Forest that climbs more than 10,000 feet. Minahan, who wasn't a cyclist at the time, wanted to complete the ride in honor of a friend, an avid rider, who had died the year before.

"He would average 7,000 miles per year, and claim that was ‘a little,'" Minahan says of his late friend. "That was in addition to rock climbing 10 weekends per year as well."

Rock climbing is where they met. Before, Minahan rarely did cardio and had never really "trained" it. But he was in good shape. The LIDAR engineer regularly hit the weights and was an avid rock climber. And for the seven months prior to his seven-week experiment, he'd been working with Nelson as a coach.

"He had a pretty decent aerobic base, and he's a pretty strong dude," Nelson says. "But he had more of an aerobic-based goal."

Even with Minahan's active lifestyle, there was still room to boost his VO2 Max, because he didn't often work at a max intensity.

"The primary thing that determines VO2 max is oxygen delivery. And the major variable is the pumping capacity of your heart," Gibala says. That's your aerobic ceiling. Lower-intensity cardio can raise the floor, allowing you to do more lower-level work. But to raise your oxygen ceiling, he says, you've got to work near that ceiling.

That near-ceiling work is normally done through high-intensity intervals, sustaining near-max efforts for a few minutes at a time, interspersed with periods of rest.

"The best evidence is repeated, three- to five-minute efforts at the highest sustainable pace," he says. "You're up around 90 to 95 percent of your maximal heart rate. You're pushing really hard during those 3- to 5-minute efforts, and you do 6, 8, or 10 of those efforts within a single workout."

One fatal flaw of many interval workouts, Nelson says, is that people focus on the time, but not on sustaining their effort level throughout that time. They work hard for three minutes, but that hard work slows down over the course of the interval. They're gassed at the end, but they haven't been working at their ceiling. That's why he suggests focusing not just on time, but on power output, as expressed in watts. This is easier to measure on a rowing machine or a bike like a Peloton, which includes power output as one of its metrics. It's harder to maintain when running.

That's exactly what Minahan found to be true for himself. After seven months of weekly lifts and cardio sessions with Nelson, he was much fitter, but he still couldn't maintain a max effort while running, fizzling out after just a few miles. And that's when he heard about the Hickson protocol.

Inside the Most Demanding Cardio Routine Ever Tested

The Hickson protocol comes from a 1977 study with the deceptively tame title, "Linear increase in aerobic power induced by a strenuous program of endurance exercise." In the study, eight subjects did six days per week of cardio exercise, alternating between two different workouts:

On days 1, 3, and 5, they did six efforts of five minutes each at their VO2 Max, with two minutes of work at half that effort in between each hard effort.
On days 2, 4, and 6, they ran as far as they could in 40 minutes, finishing when they were absolutely gassed.

After 10 weeks, the results from those 240 minutes of weekly cardio were remarkable.

"The average improvement in 10 weeks was almost 17 units of VO2 Max…it was a 44 percent average improvement," Gibala says. "You might get hurt. You might pull something. It might just be entirely unpleasant and too much for you…But if you wanted to do a crash program, this is a validated one in the literature."

For Nelson, the remarkable thing about these results was that they weren't based on an outlier. In small studies like this, he says, there's sometimes one result that throws the averages way off. In such cases, one subject got a huge benefit that made it seem like everybody did. But in this octet of trainees, all eight saw huge gains in VO2 Max.

Still, like Gibala, Nelson worries that so much volume at such a high intensity could be injurious. So when Minahan asked him about the Hickson protocol, he was reticent. Instead, he presented the gravel race hopeful with a scaled-down version he calls Meathead Cardio.

Instead of just running, like the subjects in Hickson's study, Minahan could row, bike, or run. Using the bike (in his case, a Peloton) or a Concept2 rower allowed Hickson to measure his interval efforts in watts, so he could make sure he was maintaining the same power level throughout each hard interval. He started with fewer than five intervals and did slightly shorter bursts, making sure he could work at his max throughout each interval.

Each week, he did a 1,000-meter row test to see how much he'd improved, aiming to improve by five percent each week. After seven weeks, he'd increased his average power by 26 percent on that test, a result that equates to an increase of eight units of VO2 Max.

Three Academic Blueprints to Measure and Move Your Numbers

Not every guy is going to be able to raise their VO2 Max by this much, Gibala says. If you're already a highly-trained marathon runner or avid cyclist, you may already be near your personal peak. But if you're an active, regular guy who lifts weights, does a little cardio, and maybe runs 5Ks, you may have room for this much improvement, he says. Specifically, if your VO2 Max is in the low 40s or below, you could be a candidate for a 10-point bump.

First things first, though, you need to figure out where you're starting from. And you don't need a lab test to find out. While a laboratory VO2 Max test is the gold standard for knowing your oxygen uptake, Gibala says, most guys can get by with one of several tests of cardiorespiratory fitness that have been subject to lots of academic rigor:

Row 2,000 meters: Jump on a Concept2 rowing machine, warm up a little, and see how quickly you can row 2,000 meters. You can then plug in your score with your bodyweight on the C2 website, and it'll spit out a VO2 Max estimate.
Run for 12 minutes: If you're a runner, the Cooper 12-minute test has been studied for decades. It's simple: Go to a track, and run as many laps as you can in 12 minutes. Estimate how far you've gone (one lap is 400 meters), and pop it into this formula: VO2max (mL/kg/min) = (distance in meters – 504.9) / 44.73
Walk a mile as fast as possible: You'll need a heart rate monitor for this nearly 40-year-old test. Walk a mile as fast as you can (no running!), noting your time and your heart rate at the finish. Then put your info into a Rockport 1-mile test calculator, like this one.

Now that you've got a starting point, try one of these three strategies to boost your score…and then re-test in a few months to see how much you've improved.

Step Up the Overall Volume of Vigorous Activity

If you want a higher ceiling, work closer to that ceiling, Gibala says. Go for the recommended 150 minutes of exercise per week, but devote more of that time to more vigorous work.

The evidence and public health agencies are both pointing to a greater proportion of vigorous exercise having serious longevity benefits. Recent studies have found that every minute of vigorous exercise is worth four times as much for your longevity as a minute of slower exercise. That benefit levels off a bit once the vigorous work makes up 4 percent of your weekly exercise.

You can sprinkle that vigorous work in all week, or do a concentrated VO2 Max session or two. In these types of sessions, aim for intervals lasting three to five minutes each where you're working at or near your max effort, and maintaining that effort throughout.

To do this, Nelson suggests using a machine or modality that lets you measure your power output in watts, and keep your eye on it. Your wattage should be the same throughout the interval. This means that you may have to start out a little lighter/slower than you normally would until you find what your sustainable max level is.

Once you've found it or have built to it over a series of workouts, work up to six to 10 intervals in that max range in each session. Rest as needed in between so your heart rate can come down to a composed, if not fully rested, level.

Schedule an Explicit Cardio Block During the Year

If you want to turbocharge your results, Nelson suggests setting aside part of the year to specifically concentrate on VO2 Max improvements.

"You can do this kind of longer, slower approach of still lifting two to three days per week, and doing some aerobic training and VO2 Max intervals," he says. "My bias is that if you really want to improve it, take a block of time and say, ‘I'm going to keep my strength about the same, and not make huge progress there. I'm going to prioritize aerobic training for a period, and I'm going to put more of my energy and resources in that direction."

Specifically, he says to try this: If you're an avid lifter, dial your weight training back to 50 to 70 percent of what you normally do for 6-8 weeks. This will likely allow you to maintain your current strength and muscle mass levels. Devote more of your effort (and your ability to recover) to high-intensity cardio during this stretch of time. During that time, try a more sane version of the Hickson protocol:

Do three interval sessions each week, but ramp them up. Start with ONE interval in each session that lasts five minutes at your max effort. Each week, add an interval so you're doing two intervals per session in week two, three in week three, and six intervals in week six.
Nelson suggests doing these sessions on a Concept2 rower and keeping your eye on your watts. Try to increase your watts in each interval by 5 percent each week.
Instead of going for 40 minutes all out, three times per week, do just ONE extended endurance session each week, and start shorter. In week one, go for 10 minutes. Then add five minutes each week. In week 6, you'll be at a 40-minute session. These endurance sessions should feel like an 8.5 out of 10 effort.
Lift 2 to 3 days per week, maximum during this time, and do around half of what you'd normally do.

Once the six to eight weeks are up, re-test and see how your VO2 Max has grown. Then do a section of a similar amount of time where you're more focused on your strength training, sprinkling in some VO2 Max sessions here and there.

This is what Minahan is doing now. After completing seven weeks of his modified Hickson plan, the 45-year-old said he was starting to plateau. So he set aside the intense cardio schedule for a bit and went back to more lifting. He plans to do another six- to eight-week streak later in the year, building towards his target gravel race in October.

Leverage Body Weight for a Simple Mathematical Bump

For many guys, losing weight might be the simplest path. Because your VO2 Max is expressed in milliliters per kilogram per minute. Those kilograms are your body weight. So if you lose weight, your VO2 Max should go up.

But that's probably not going to work if you crash diet, Gibala says. Your fitness is likely to suffer. However, if you've got weight to lose and drop it over the course of a few months while remaining fit and active, your VO2 Max should go up.

"Lose 10 percent of your body weight," he says, "and your VO2 Max will probably go up by about 10 percent."

This story was originally published by Men's Journal on Jun 3, 2026, where it first appeared in the Health & Fitness section. Add Men's Journal as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

This story was originally published June 3, 2026 at 4:36 PM.