I’m 30 and am one of those guys now. I’ve been weightlifting regularly since I was 14. In the 16 years I’ve had a few sabbaticals, maybe 2 years total off. Even when traveling the world or cross country, we find gyms.
When you do it so long and are actually “good” at it (I.e. you know your body in and out) it’s really not that time consuming. I’ve tried everything over the last decade. 5 days a week, 3 days on, 1 day off, etc. in my early 20’s I did a year or so of training legs twice as often as everything else and they really caught up. I have probably one of the more proportioned bodies in most gyms because of it (most guys legs suck). It’s actually one of my favorite days now, and I’m very proud of my big vascular legs that carry almost no body fat.
To touch back on one I mentioned, once you know your body, it’s not that time consuming to look like a “meathead.”
My wife and I lift weights 3 days a week, approximately 1 hour/day. I think most people could easily fit that in their schedule. We have our sets, reps, exercises, etc down to where they need to be.
What’s bigger than that, is our diet is pretty much down to a science. Like my lifting, I’ve experimented everywhere there as well. We proportion all our meals and adjust accordingly based on our goals. My wife cooks it all which isn’t that challenging. We eat very delicious and healthy meals. This year we’ve started intermittent fasting as a way to control hunger, which I’ve loved.
This year I also started running about 3 days/wk. prior to this year I’ve never done cardio in my life and it’s not necessary to be big and muscular, but I’ve really been enjoying it. I hope to run a 20 minute 5k next year while still being able to squat 2x body weight and bench 1.5x body weight. That seems like an impressive goal to me (I’m there strengthwise, 5k time is hard for a newer runner, especially one my size)
I don’t think any of this seems less attainable as I hit 40 and 50, and beings I’ll be working far less then, it should be even easier. Last winter I worked 700 hours of overtime over a 6-7 month period, and I don’t think I missed a single day in the weight room, despite all the 80 hr weeks.