A fit body leads to a long life, as they say, and hopefully you're hitting the gym to not just get big, but also to give yourself the inner strength to last 60,70 more years in style. What's the use of being buff if you don't survive to lord it over people at your high school reunions well into the future, after all. Need a little inspiration? Check out these 10 senior citizens who are totally ripped. Some pump iron, others tackle insane endurance races, but the common thread is that they're probably in better shape than you are and get discounts on movie tickets.
Don Wildman![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
The founder of the Bally's Total Fitness chain of gyms is a living advertisement for his own product.
Don Wildman is 82 and still pushing his body to its limits with triathlons, weightlifting, epic mountain bike rides and more. Three days a week, Wildman puts himself through a grueling custom weight workout called the Circuit, where he does sixteen groups of exercises for a terrifying total of 3,000 reps. That arduous training has enabled Wildman to do insane things like paddle around the entirety of the Hawaiian islands while he was in his 70s. Wildman also has three Ironman triathlons under his belt.
Ernestine Shepherd![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Holding the Guinness World Record for the world's oldest competitive female bodybuilder,
Ernestine Shepherd was a model in her youth but let her health decline for a few decades. When she couldn't fit in her swimsuit at the age of 54, she embarked on a fitness kick that would reshape her body into a lean, sinewy miracle. Under the tutelage of a former Mr. Universe, the 79-year-old Shepherd has won multiple bodybuilding titles, runs 80 miles a week and benches 150. She now works as a personal trainer in Baltimore, where she helps people of all ages get into the best shape they possibly can.
Yuichiro Miura![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Less than 700 people have ever made it to the summit of Mount Everest, the tallest mountain in the world. Japanese climber
Yuichiro Miura has done it three times -- all after he turned 70. His first ascent came in 2003, and his most recent came 10 years later, at the ripe old age of 80. That climb was one he barely survived -- recent surgeries for both a heart condition and a shattered pelvis put him in rough shape, and on the way down he felt like he was at death's door. Miura, who is the son of a famous Japanese professional skier, set a number of skiing records in his youth and doesn't intend to stop scaling mountains anytime soon. In a recent interview, he says that he wants to reach the summit one more time in 2023 when he's 90.
Pat Gallant-Charette![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Many doctors recommend swimming as a form of exercise for older people because it's easy on the joints, but
Pat Gallant-Charette takes it to the extreme. She started training for her first race at the age of 46 and quickly discovered that she had a skill for distance swimming. As she aged, she discovered that her strength and endurance were only increasing, and started pushing herself to tackle longer and longer distances. Some of her most epic journeys include swimming Japan's 33-mile Tsugaru Strait, a 21-mile swim around Catalina Island, and she's working on being the oldest person ever to tackle the Ocean's Seven -- the four toughest open-water swims in the world.
Mike Brooks![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Running a single marathon is enough to wipe out most people of any age -- the human body simply isn't built to handle 26.2 miles in one day. So how do you explain 70-year-old Missouri native
Mike Brooks, who just knocked out seven marathons in seven consecutive days? Brooks, a former Maine fire chief, started running in 1994 when his weight and bad smoking habit threatened his health, and over the last few decades has transformed his body into a lean, mean cardio machine. His week of marathons raised $15,000 for Camp Sunshine, a retreat in Maine for kids with life-threatening illnesses. Even though he's slowing down with age, Brooks still runs 70 races a year, including multiple ultra-marathons.
Sy Perlis![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
It's fair to say that
Sy Perlis has you beat in the badass department. The 94-year-old powerlifter is a World War II veteran who demolished the bench press world record for people 90 and over in 2013 by a staggering 52.2 pounds. Perlis' press of 187.2 pounds was vastly higher than the previous contender. The Arizona man credits his strength to a rigorous five-day-a week workout program that he started after getting a pacemaker put into his heart in 2012. Considering the average male at his peak can bench about 150, it's pretty insane that a man in his 90s can do better.
Philippa Raschker![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Widely regarded as one of the best athletes in the world of any age,
Eileen Philippa "Phil" Raschker started competing in track & field at the age of 13 and stuck with it her whole life. Now 69 years old, she holds a whopping 71 gold medals from the World Masters Athletic Championships in a wide variety of events. During the day, she works as an accountant in Marietta, Georgia -- an occupation that gives her the freedom to travel the world and compete. With every Masters event that she goes to, she enters 10 separate events at minimum, including the heptathlon, 100-, 200- and 400-meter sprints, 80- and 300-meter hurdles, high jump, pole vault, long jump and triple jump. And she kicks ass at all of them.
Ed Whitlock![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
How fast do you think you could run a marathon? Chances are you can't beat the 2:54:48 time by
Ed Whitlock, one of the world's fastest and strongest senior distance runners. He set that record at the tender age of 73, but he didn't rest on his laurels. The Canadian powerhouse has over 80 age group records for a vast variety of competitions, and aims to get no more than one percent slower for every year that passes. At 85, Whitlock is still pushing himself to break his previous records, recently doing the Waterloo half marathon in 1:50:47. The only training he does is running around a 1/3 mile loop track near his house for hours every day, not listening to music or distracting himself in any way.
Jacinto Bonilla![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
CrossFit is a popular fitness program that has its share of critics, many who allege that the high-intensity workouts can be tough on your body. That hasn't stopped 74-year-old
Jacinto Bonilla, though. Bonilla started CrossFit in 2009 and has become a frequent competitor, going up against men half his age. When he was 69, the company named a Workout Of The Day after him -- the Jacinto Storm consists of six exercises, each one done once for every year of Bonilla's life. He plans to keep up his CrossFit training and competing until he turns 100, and we believe he can pull it off.
Hidekichi Miyazaki![10 Senior Citizens In Better Shape Than You]()
Let's close this out with the oldest athlete on this list -- Japan's "Golden Bolt," 105-year-old sprinter
Hidekichi Miyazaki. Miyazaki only started running after his 90th birthday, and has smashed world records for century-old racers. He specializes in the short races, 100 meters in particular, and at just 29.83 seconds holds a pretty impressive pace for a dude that's a hundred years old. That's a meter for every year he's lived, plus some change. A sensible diet and daily exercise are Miyazaki's ingredients for a long and healthy life, and he plans to continue running sprints and trying to beat his best until they put him in the ground.
