Fun and Fitness for the 40-Something

Is it just me, or has Dara Torres, the 41-year-old triple silver medal winner at the Beijing Olympics, set the bar a little too high for us normal folk? Winning medals in five different Olympics (dating back to 1984!) is mind-blowing enough, but what about that body?

My 47-year-old sister (who lost 65 pounds this year and looks healthy and radiant) thought Torres looked like a monster in this photo. My 49-year-old brother, on the other hand, said he’d like to see more Torres photos on this site. Go figure.

I think it’s inspiring—and eye-opening—to see what a 41-year-old body can do if pushed to the max. But I also think that Torres’ value as a role model is limited. How many of us can truly emulate her? The New York Times reported that “Torres’s retinue includes a head coach, a sprint coach, a strength coach, two stretchers, two masseuses, a chiropractor and a nanny, at the cost of at least $100,000 per year.” I don’t have that kind of staff or extra cash. Do you? So my verdict is: Dara as a motivator, yes; Dara as a measuring stick, no.

The good news is that one key component of her routine—what she calls her “secret weapon”—comes with a much lower bill. Torres swears by “resistance training,” a flexibility and strength-building program that uses your own force to work out muscles. As explained in Time, the exercises “generally require no equipment other than a mat and maybe a towel and some straps—and they may not feel that strenuous, but you know the next day that you’ve had a workout.” As you stretch, you focus also on flexing or contracting your muscles, with the goal of actively elongating muscles.

The conclusion of the Time article (”As doctors urge even us non-Olympians to remain physically active throughout our lives, maybe we’ll start to pay more attention to stretching. After all, look what it does for Torres.”) has drawn some criticism for overstating the role of the stretching in Torres’ achievements. Her overall routine involves much, much more, but I blame the writer more for falling prey to the tendency in news magazines to conclude most articles “cutesy.” It’s a journalism pet peeve of mine.

But enough about me—after all, it’s time to dive into the weekend! Hope yours goes swimmingly!

This entry was posted on Friday, August 22nd, 2008 at 7:29 am and is filed under General Fitness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.