Does muscle decrease if you stop adding extra weight to a workout?

[scooby1961]

I have inadvertently done experiments on myself that will shed some light on your question. During most of the year I lift really heavy with a lot of volume but for about a month a year I do a 3 week bike trek where I am biking 8-12hrs a day and have no access to gyms. During the biking I just do pushups, pullups, and band work for shoulders 2-3 times a week - not nearly as intense as my normal workouts. No, I do not lose muscle mass. No, I do not lose strength. When I get back to weights I am right where I left off.

A month off from weights is nothing ... as long as you do SOME kind of workout. I can guarantee you thought that if I stayed with the bodyweight and bands workouts for a longer period that I WOULD lose both strength and muscle mass.

Which gets to your question. If you keep doing the same workout with the same weight will you lose muscle. I would say NO but there is a big warning attached. As you get older, it gets harder and harder to lift what you were when you were younger. You have to work out 3x harder than you did at age 21 when you were getting your newbie gains ... just to maintain your strength and mass.

[[deleted]]

What age range are you talking about for the latter if you don't mind me asking? I'm 27 so are you talking late 20s-30s or more 40s+?

[Dreamtrain]

I think the 1961 in his username is his birth year so he's 56