We have all heard the saying, “life begins at 40.” Now, a new study suggests that endurance exercise can, too, while still providing the same heart benefits as it would if started before the age of 30.

The research team, including David Matelot of the Inserm 1099 unit at the University of Rennes in France, recently presented their findings at the EuroPRevent Congress in the Netherlands.

For their study, they assessed 40 healthy men from France aged between 55 and 70 years old. All participants were split into groups dependent on their levels of exercise and the age at which they began.

This resulted in three groups; one group had never exercised more than 2 hours a week throughout their lifetime, another group exercised at least 7 hours a week over 5 years and started before the age of 30, while the third group exercised at least 7 hours a week and started after the age of 40. Exercise in all groups involved either running or cycling.

On average, those who started exercising before the age of 30 had been training for an average of 39 years, or from the age of 22. Those who started exercising after 40 had been training for an average of 18 years, or from the age of 48.

To see the effects exercise had on the participants’ hearts, their heart rates and oxygen uptake were measured during maximal exercise. They also underwent echocardiography – a test that uses sound waves to generate moving pictures of the heart – at rest and during maximal exercise.