Young At Heart

Latest research shows a lifelong fitness regime can shave decades off your biological age.

- Nicky Pellegrino

To mark his 80th birthday, Gavin Riley ran to the top of Te Mata Peak. Okay, he didn’t run all the way, although he would have liked to. Restricted blood flow in his legs means such a feat is beyond the Havelock North octogenarian these days. Still, he did run the final 200m to the summit and his regular weekly exercise routine would put many people half his age to shame.

Riley has been a runner most of his life. He started racing in his early school days in the 1940s and even in his busiest years, working full-time as a journalist and raising four children, he ran to and from work to keep fit.

“I feel more alive when I’m running than when I do anything else,” says Riley, now 82. He believes the mantra that all of us should live by is “wear out, don’t rust out”. Despite creaky knees, the claudication in his legs that causes them to cramp, and damaged vertebrae in his back from running on hard roads in thin-soled shoes back in the 1960s before modern trainers, he keeps pounding the pavements. These days, he heads out for 40 minutes of alternate walking and running three days a week and supplements that with a series of strengthening and flexibility exercises, including a lot of single leg squats and planking, in his garage.

“It totals six hours a week over five days,” he says.

Riley admits his family think he is obsessed. “Someone did point out to me that all the hours of exercising may add up to far more than any extra lifespan. But I like the feeling of being fit.

And it slows down the diminishing of your quality of life. Keeping mobile is what it’s all about.”

At his peak in the 1970s, Riley was running more than 200km a week. Even at 57, he came third in a 24-hour race in Tauranga, and he didn’t retire from racing until he was 62. He believes his continued regimen is what keeps him healthy.