The yoga teacher
Elisabeth Wengersky has never been one for sitting around. As far as she’s concerned, park benches are not for resting weary bones, but more of a yoga prop for some outdoor exercise.
While most 82-year-olds might consider a Sunday walk in the country or a game of bowls a decent bash at exercise, Elisabeth can often be seen dashing across town to teach yoga to students a fraction of her age, which she does several times a week.
For example, on a Thursday she leads a lunchtime class. In the afternoon she might get creative making birthday cards for her huge circle of family and friends or preparing dinner for a friend – then a few hours later it’s back across town for her second class, which begins at 7pm.
Not content with this level of activity, this lively and charming lady also manages to fit in four two-hour sessions per week as a participant. But this is nothing compared to her early days of teaching when she would sometimes take five classes in a day.
Elisabeth learned the yoga of B.K.S. Iyengar, often called ‘the father of yoga’. Every single pose must be practised to perfection using intense focus, even down to making sure the inner edge of your big toe is pushing down. To become a teacher you need to have an in-depth knowledge of anatomy and physiology, and Elisabeth used to spend a month in India each year perfecting her technique.
Such devotion to exercise is evident in her incredibly lithe, flexible body, but more surprising when you learn she only discovered yoga at the age of 43.
Elisabeth, who has never married, recalls: “I vividly remember watching my sister demonstrating her yoga poses for me. When I saw her do a headstand, I was utterly fascinated, and from that moment on I was determined to get it right myself.
“I suppose it was quite an ambition, considering I couldn’t even touch my toes at the time. In fact, I could only just reach my knees.” Watching Elisabeth placing her palms flat on the ground now, that’s very hard to imagine.
Not only that, but she survived a catastrophic blow to her perfectly aligned yoga body in 1988 when she fell nine metres from a cliff during a night-time stroll. Mistaking a dark piece of slate for a turn in the path, Elisabeth realised too late that this was where the path ended. She clung by her hands until she could hang on no longer.
Six weeks later she walked out of the hospital to the astonishment of everyone, doctors included. “I knew I would leave on my own two legs, even if they were in plaster,” she says. “But being my impatient self, I left before I really should have and as a result I still have to work extra hard at certain yoga poses.
“Everyone thought I would end up paraplegic, but even though I couldn’t move when I fell, I was determined to walk again,” she says.
“I firmly believe age is no barrier to fitness.”
The sprinter
At 73, champion sprinter Mary Axtell just can’t stop running. Instead of taking the car on errands, Mary prefers to run, and is a familiar sight around her home town, hotfooting it past all the other pedestrians.
Mary recently competed in the UK at a major athletics championships. “My race was right after 95-year-old Dr Charles Eugster broke the 200m world record,” she says.
“Everyone was cheering and clapping like mad because he was so amazing. And I loved that he didn’t turn into an old man once he finished the race – that shows he’s young for his age on and off the track.
“I firmly believe age is no barrier to fitness. I tell anyone who thinks they can’t be fit once they receive their pension to start slowly and don’t set your goals too high. Even a daily 50-metre walk to the shops and back will get you on the path to a fit, healthy life.”
Mary remembers vividly the day she caught the running bug. “It was Coronation Day and my primary school was having a race on the grass. I was determined to do well so I could win a coronation mug and I remember feeling so happy when I won, even beating the boys.”
Nothing could stop Mary from her sporting ambitions. She played hockey until the age of 46 and remembers being called to a match three weeks after the birth of her third child Charlotte, 40. (She has two other daughters, Jo, 47, and Cathy, 45.) “There was no question I wouldn’t accept the offer to play, although I did try not to overdo it,” she says.
Given the amount of running Mary has done over the years, it’s not surprising her knees have taken a battering. After two knee operations the physio suggested she should call time on her sporty life, but Mary wouldn’t hear of it. That was 10 years ago and she’s proved them all wrong by winning races galore.
Mary says: “Every time I visit the doctor, we go through this conversation about my date of birth being wrong. If I see a new doctor, they always look confused when they see how old I am.
“It’s a real compliment but I really don’t see myself as elderly. Of course I worry about injuries, but I know that if I do hurt myself, my recovery time is always good because I keep myself very fit.”
Mary still works as a university exam invigilator, which she loves, because meeting younger people keeps her feeling young herself. She also loves cooking and entertaining, and can spend an entire afternoon gardening without even a twinge.
At her athletics club, Mary is the oldest member and is an inspiration to the others – some of whom are as young as 15.
“At the club there is no barrier to age or ability. I participate in all aspects of training, including running with straight legs, which really challenges the hamstrings.”
Training also involves skipping and low hurdles, which would be a challenge to many 40-somethings.
“The thing I love about running is that no matter how down I might feel – sometimes even running around the track in tears – by the end I feel euphoric. I’m generally a positive person, but everyone has down days and tricky challenges in life. The best and easiest way to improve your mood is to take a long walk, go for a swim, just do something active. Suddenly the world seems like a better place.”
“If I’m feeling fed up or lacking in energy, I exercise my bad mood away.”
The gym bunny
At 68, Rojie Mir-hosseini Attwell is a relative youngster, but her glowing, dewy skin and muscle tone, plus her obvious zest for life, give her the demeanour of someone 20 years younger.
Rojie has been exercising for more than 35 years, long before gyms were commonplace in almost every suburb.
She says: “I knew I had to do some form of exercise, as being naturally slim has never featured in my family and I adore food, so dieting to lose weight was out of the question.
“The only place to exercise near me was full of free weights and hardly any women, but I was determined to get fit.” In fact, the club’s website described it then as “very much a hardcore steel and iron weightlifter’s gym”.
“I loved the energy it gave me,” Rojie recalls. “I had a trainer and every now and again you would see people oiling up in the gym and posing in front of the mirrors so they could appreciate how their muscle definition was improving.
“I was so proud when I came third in the club’s bodybuilding competition. I still have my weightlifting belt from those days!”
In her 40s, Rojie ran a marathon and experienced her first Forrest Gump moment when, on crossing the finish line, she found she couldn’t stop running. “I was so exhilarated by the run that my body did not want to stop,” she recalls. “I even spent the night of the marathon dreaming about running.”
Since then Rojie has run two more marathons and just last year, aged 67, she walked an overnight marathon to raise money for breast cancer.
“I felt simply fantastic afterwards and will never forget that wonderful feeling of watching the sunrise. I was on top of the world.”
Until last year, Rojie, who has been married to husband Rodney for 42 years, also loved spin classes. These high-intensity workouts on stationary bicycles are usually full of super-fit youngsters, but that didn’t put this superwoman off.
Unfortunately, she broke a ligament in her knee, not by overexercising, but by not securing her foot to the pedal adequately.
After surgery her doctors and physio were amazed at how quickly Rojie’s knee healed, telling her it was the speediest recovery time they had
ever seen.
However, the operation means that Rojie, who has one son, Grant, and two grandchildren, isn’t allowed to run any more. But hanging up her trainers and putting her feet up is not an option. Rojie now works out at the gym four times a week and keeps up the three-times-a-week yoga habit she’s had for the past 20 years.
Her advice to people who struggle to get to the gym is to make it such a habit that it becomes like eating and breathing.
“Treating myself to a permanent locker was the best present to myself. Because now, if I’m walking down the street feeling a bit fed up or lacking in energy, I can just walk into the gym and exercise my bad mood away. I don’t have to go home to get my kit and that makes it all so easy.
“I never question whether I will make it to the gym. Exercising is such a part of my life I never think about whether or not to go… ever.”
Photography by Gemma Day for S Magazine/N&S Syndication.
