Older Athletes Keep Going; Faster, Stronger and Longer, With Plenty of Help

By Associated Press

Published 5 months ago on

February 1, 2025

Modern elite athletes extend careers with high-tech support, mirroring Formula 1 teams in their approach to maintenance and performance. (AP File)

Elite athletes like LeBron James and Lindsey Vonn maintain peak performance with extensive support teams and advanced recovery methods.
Olympic data shows peak performance age for women athletes is now similar to men, reflecting cultural changes in sports.
Aging athletes are closing the gap with younger competitors, thanks to improved resources and recovery techniques.

Aging athletes such as LeBron James, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lindsey Vonn are similar to racing cars — maintained by tinkering mechanics, data analysts, and shelves of replacement parts

“If you look at many elite athletes now, they have an army of supporting staff like a Formula 1 team,” Hirofumi Tanaka, a Japan-born exercise physiologist at the University of Texas at Austin, told The Associated Press in an interview.

Los Angeles Lakers star James and World Cup skier Vonn just turned 40, and soccer’s Ronaldo hits the Big-Four-Oh on Feb. 5. Add seven-time Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton, who turned 40 just a few weeks ago as he moves this season to Ferrari.

“They have physical therapists, dietitians, massage therapists, strength coaches, and so on,” Tanaka added. “With this holistic approach these elite athletes are helped to maintain their performance.”

Others like quarterback Tom Brady, hockey’s Jaromir Jagr, and pitcher Nolan Ryan retired at the top and well into their 40s. Martina Navratilova won the U.S. Open mixed doubles title in 2006 — just a month short of turning 50.

Then there’s Gordie Howe, who finished his last National Hockey League season (1979-80) at 52. Japanese soccer player Kazuyoshi Miura turns 58 in February and plans to play with fourth-tier club Suzuka — his 40th professional season.

And don’t forget Hall of Famer Satchel Paige, who didn’t allow a run pitching three innings in a Major League game at 59 with the Kansas City Athletics in 1965.

This isn’t exactly new, but it used to be rare. What’s changed is the frequency, the array of aides supporting the stars, and the reality — the expectation — that athletes can compete longer and produce.

Watch any Grand Slam tennis tournament. The winner and losing finalist inevitably thank their “teams” as a half-dozen staffers rise to stadium applause.

Peak Performance at the Olympics

Tanaka analyzed Olympic data starting with the first modern Games in 1896, and he’s found the peak-performance age for men has remained stable — between 20-30 — depending on the discipline.

But gradually all Olympians are getting older, and the statistics for women bear this out.

“Women’s peak performance age was much younger 20 or 30 years ago,” he said. “But now that peak-performance age is becoming very similar to men.”

Tanaka attributed this partly to cultural change in regard to marriage and child-bearing, which used to prompt women to drop out earlier from elite competition.

Of course, there are exceptions like Syrian Hend Zaza. At 12, she was the youngest in the Tokyo Olympics, delayed a year until 2021.

The best evidence that athletes are staying longer and maintaining performance is seen in so-called Masters athletes. There is no standard age as each sport sets different parameters.

“Older athlete are getting closer and closer to younger athletes,” Tanaka said, speaking of both men and women. “And the older the Masters athlete is, the greater the improvement.”

The Case of LeBron James

James is reported to spend about $1.5 million annually on his body to stay fit, a number he neither confirms nor denies. He can afford it with an estimated worth of more than $1 billion.

James talks about staying on top in the Netflix series “Starting 5.” Maybe he’s not getting better with age, but there is little drop-off.

“In some ways he’s a freak of nature,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver has said. “I’ve been around a lot of great players and he’s one of the hardest-working players I’ve been around. I mean, he doesn’t take a day off. He seems to not take an afternoon off.

“He’s always working on some part of his body,” Silver added. “You meet with him and he’s always soaking something or eating something or has some contraption attached to him.”

Lindsey Vonn’s Comeback and Her Titanium Knee

Vonn is making a comeback on the World Cup circuit after getting a new titanium right knee. James, of course, has never been away after breaking into the NBA and 18.

Like James, Vonn talks about the benefits of ice baths and new recovery methods that were not around earlier in her career.

She said she gets inspiration from athletes like Brady, Hamilton and Serena Williams, who won her last Grand Slam singles title at 35 at the Australian Open in 2017. She was several weeks pregnant at the time, which she didn’t announce until months later.

“Tom, Lewis, Serena. They’ve all done it,” Vonn said. “The resources that athletes have now allow for a better recovery. So even though you’re older, you’re still recovering faster than I was when I was in my 20s.”

Vonn told The AP recently in an interview in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, that she might be doing less to stay fit, or at least less to keep her knee functioning.

“My knee doesn’t bother me,” she said. “I don’t wake up and have to do kneecap (exercises) for 15 minutes and do a 30-minute warmup just to walk out the door.

“I am doing a normal warmup like normal athletes do,” she added. “I don’t have to do anything different which takes a lot less energy, a lot less mental strain.”

Now she simply focuses on maintaining the other parts of her body.

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Andrew Dampf in Rome contributed to this report.