Eighty-one? I shook my head and sur-
reptitiously leaned over to get a better
look at the number Sharpie’d on the calf
of the tall, lean, and considerably older
woman setting down her running shoes
in the transition area next to mine. Yep,
I’d read right. She was 81 years old. I
was 26, at my very first triathlon. My
primary goal was just to survive. The
next: grow up to be that woman, still
lacing up and toeing the line in her ninth
decade of life.
Turns out, that’s not such a far-
fetched goal. Research on aging runners
shows that you can not only stay in the
game but also—contrary to popular
belief—keep crushing it far longer than
you may think. Here’s a decade-by-
decade guide to keep you running strong
for the rest of your life.
20s
This is a time you can get away with not
worrying much about recovery, says
Nicholas DiNubile, M.D., orthopedic sur-
geon and best-selling author. It’s also the
age when you’re building a foundation
you’ll carry with you, so play it smart.
Start by cross-training. You may not
realize it, but you’re developing stresses
and imbalances that build up and can
reach a breaking point, says DiNubile.
If all you do is run, you’ll develop more
issues that can haunt you down the road.
“Cross-train twice a week with another
sport or strength-training to create bal-
anced fitness,” he says.To maximize skeletal strength, follow
hard runs with a protein- and carb-rich
snack like a whey protein fruit smoothie.
Both men and women hit peak bone mass
by age 30. Though women are at higher
risk for low bone density, research finds
young, lean active men like runners in
their 20s are also at risk. That doesn’t
mean you need to stop running; it just
means you need to eat enough to fuel
your recovery, which in turn maintains
bone mineral density and testosterone,
and, for women, prevents menstrual
cycle dysfunction, says exercise physi-
ologist Stacy Sims, Ph.D., of University
of Waikato in New Zealand.
30s
Life can get a little complicated in this
decade (think: career, family, home), so
balanced intensity and recovery are key
to maintaining form on a time budget.
Train with intervals. VO2 max—how
much oxygen your body can use during
exercise—slips 10 percent per decade after
age 30. Running can help you stem the
decline to about half of that, but intervals
may even boost it, says exercise physi-
ologist Paul Laursen, Ph.D.. When you
do high-intensity intervals, your heart
rate stays elevated during the recovery
periods, so you’re still tapping into and
developing your aerobic energy system.
Go for short, hard intervals like 400s to
800s to build your aerobic system while
also recruiting fast-twitch sprint fibers,
which diminish with age. PerformingRUN STRONG
FOR LIFE
BY SELENE YEAGERRUNNERS
REWRITING
HISTORYWe’ve all heard that ath-
letes peak in their late
20s and early 30s and
then it’s all downhill. But
that’s based on dated
data collected decades
ago, explains Iñigo San
Millán, Ph.D., associate
research professor in
Human Physiology and
Nutrition at the Univer-
sity of Colorado. “We
have to look at aging
differently now,” he says.
When scientists stud-
ied track athletes aged
50 to 85, they found
only a small decline in
performance—less than
2 percent—between the
ages of 50 and 75. After
75, that decline grew to
just 8 percent per year—
more pronounced, but
still not show-stopping.
In fact, in 2004, Ed Whit-
lock, a 73-year-old Cana-
dian, ran a record-setting
2:54:48 marathon, which
beat the winning time at
the first modern Olym-
pic marathon in Athens:
2:58:50 by 23-year-old
Spyros Louis in 1896.
We’re not only living
and staying active
longer, but we also have
more knowledge on how
to train, recover, and fuel
to keep us in the game.
It’s never too late to
apply it, and maybe even
set a personal best, says
San Millán, who recently
helped a 60-year-old
client shave 75 minutes
from his marathon PR.34 RUNNERSWORLD.COM