Three world-class senior athletes share a glimpse into their sporting experiences and reveal a common thread in the challenges and motivations of choosing to swim, run and slide their days away.
By by Christine Szudzik
In the world of sports, it's nothing new when athletes retire at the ripe old age of 18. If they're still playing when they hit the big 3-0? They're ancient, a physical marvel for the world to admire. And when they're over 50, the only roles left for them are in the announcers' booth or coaches' box. Right?
Thousands of athletes around the world continue to blow these outdated assumptions out of the water. Three ground-breaking female athletes who continue to participate in sport – swimmer Shane Gould, 50; luger Anne Abernathy, 53; and sprinter Irene Obera, 73 – gathered to discuss the impressive gains made in women's sports, to tell stories of past triumphs and to emphasize the benefits of athletic participation at any age.
Gould, who won three gold medals for her native Australia at the 1972 Olympic Games, said over the years, the biggest difference she's noticed is the massive increase in girls' and women's participating in sports.
“They are understanding fitness, feeling comfortable in their bodies and are OK about using sport as a social outlet,” she said. “It's like they've been given permission.”
When Gould was younger, she experienced her fair share of discrimination. After she first retired from competitive swimming at the age of 16, she picked up surfing – and was the only girl in the water.
“The guys would sort of look at me and think, ‘What are you doing here?' I said, ‘Well, I'm not going to sit on the beach being a bikini girl,'” she said. “Because I didn't know that girls weren't supposed to do those things, in my ignorance, I just did it anyhow. And then I was part of the swell of change.”
Obera, who narrowly missed the cut for both the 1960 and 1968 Olympic Games, said that women had to fight for their rights in masters track and field. At the first World Masters Championships in 1975, race officials didn't organize the women's races correctly. In the semifinal round, all the fastest women ended up in the same heat. Obera and her fellow competitors protested, and the race officials responded.
“I think it took them about a half an hour, but they did it,” Obera said. “And everything worked out. It was funny because the head clerk for the course afterwards, he apologized, hugged us, all this and that.”
Abernathy, the oldest woman to compete in the Olympic Games and who proudly bears the nickname “Grandma Luge,” said that inequality of the sexes remains in her sport. Luge has three categories: men's singles, women's singles and mixed doubles. However, the doubles category is “mixed” in name only. It is very uncommon for women to compete in the event.
“There's no way we can compete the same as men, just because our bodies are different and fit different,” she said. “All they did was just change the name of the event.”
Now that these women have seen and fought for such major gains in women's sports, they're also able to benefit from them. But all three women cited health reasons as their main incentive to keep participating in sports.
“The prime motivation is that I just function better when I'm active,” Gould said. “And the competitive activities are just like carrots that give a focus or a structure to work out.”
When Gould attended her first masters swim meet, she received a healthy dose of inspiration from a fellow competitor.
“I saw an 80-year-old lady from Japan, just upright, spritely, shiny eyes,” she said. “I thought, ‘God, I'd love to be healthy and alert and sharp like she is when I'm 80.'”
Obera agreed, saying sports are an outlet for her goal-oriented attitude. Currently on a mini-break from track and field, Obera's goals are scoring a 500 set in bowling and improving her tennis game.
“It just feels good to move in a coordinated way,” she said.
Abernathy said she considered retiring after the 2002 Olympic Games, but once she realized the magnitude of her accomplishments, she was determined to compete in Torino.
“I realized that I was in a position to do something that no woman had ever done before,” she said. “And set a mark and break down a barrier that had never been broken before. That was my impetus to go to this last Olympics. It was to break that 50-year barrier, because it shouldn't be there.”
While Abernathy's time in Torino was short-lived (she crashed in the preliminaries and was disqualified), she received supporting letters and messages from fans all over the world.
“I got one from a woman that said, ‘I don't think you realize how important the impact that you've made, but I'm 37 and already I'm feeling invisible in my office. But because of you, I've gone out and started training for a half-marathon. And I feel more important.'” she said. “And I went, ‘Whoa!'”
All of the women agreed that they had experienced discrimination not only because of their gender, but also because of their age. When Gould qualified for the Australian Swimming Championships in 2004, she knew some people didn't think she belonged competing against swimmers who were her children's age. But Gould looked upon the experience as a chance to send a message: that people of all ages should aim for healthy lives.
“I think that was a message that got across, but there was a little bit of tongue-in-cheek with me being there,” she said. “Maybe I shouldn't have been there, but, I was. I didn't really care what people thought.”
In fact, all three accomplished women wanted to emphasize the benefits of sport participation amongst the older generation. Abernathy said that, in fact, sport might be most important for older women.
“If the kids don't have the role models, then they're not going to get involved,” she said.
Abernathy also suggested that our society's emphasis on competition and winning has helped discourage older women.
“Being in sport doesn't mean you have to win,” she said. “You win just by being in the sport.”
Obera echoed Abernathy's thoughts and encouraged the next generation of female athletes to maintain their active lifestyles.
“If you're training and you enjoy it, just continue,” she said. “You can also become a coach. You can always contribute. But I think, personally, if you've been competing, to me, it would be very difficult to quit. You know, there is life after college. Why give it up?”