Phew! Even watching the catch-up for the Olympics is tiring.
Returning to Rebecca’s theme from last week on age and the Olympics, here’s some more age related news from Rio. The BBC have helpfully produced a summary of the great performances from older athletes and here’s some further news of note:
- The new 400m world record holder, South African Wayde Van Niekerek is coached by a 74 yr old
- Nick Skelton, the show jumper, is competing in his seventh Olympics age 58 (his elder brother is also in the team!)
- Katherine Grainger discusses retirement from rowing – age 40 – as the biggest challenge of her career. Viewing it as a transition seems a good way to start.
Of particular concern for us tennis fans is Andy Murray’s comment at the end of his epic Gold Medal victory this morning was that he might be too old for 2020. Hope he reads these stories and changes his mind – he was rather shattered at the time of the interview!
And of course, its not just age at the older end that has been making news. Remembering that different sports have different age regulations, we have already mentioned that at 13 years old swimmer Gaurika Singh of Nepal is the youngest competitor. Also in the pool, Penny Oleksiak, Canada, at 16 became the games youngest medalist (so far). I am assuming that birthdays separate her and the American Ginny Trasher who had that headline earlier in the games.
Katrina Pritchard
Rebecca Whiting
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