How Does This Amazing 94-Year-Old Woman Set World Athletic Records?

Olga Kotelko is off-the-charts amazing.  She took up track and field at age 77 and at age 94 she holds 26 world records including age-group bests in the high jump, the hammer throw and the 200-meter run. But how did she do that?  And how is she aging so well?

Writer Bruce Grierson wanted to find out and got Olga’s cooperation to work with him because, as he put it: “Whatever was happening with her was the opposite of what was happening to me.”  Together they consulted researchers in gerontology, exercise physiology and genetics looking into the mystery of Olga’s youthfulness.  It turns out she is neither a genetic freak nor a health nut.

Read about what makes Olga run in this summary of Grierson’s book on The New York Times “Well” blog.