Who are the oldest athletes in sports?

Years are just a number. This maxim is commonly debated among all mortals. Even among some athletes, for whom the inexorable passage of time is an obstacle to extending their sports career. Even less that they continue to be champions in their sports disciplines. Even the best bookmakers in Panama do not quote in favor of these sports leaders. Sometimes an athlete’s desire to progress is capable of breaking all records. The Spaniard Carlos Sainz is the latest example of great athletes who achieve fame at an age close to retirement.

Carlos Sainz, a veteran with a future

From panel to panel. Spaniard Carlos Sainz surpassed his own record as the oldest champion of the Dakar Rally; a test that brings all participants closer to unimagined limits. At the wheel of an Audi (he made history and won with a hybrid car), the driver born in Madrid registered his fourth Dakar at the age of 61 on his ID card. Challenging the limits of human being. Longevity that is nothing new for Carlos Sainz, as he has improved since winning this race at the age of 55. And who knows if they will continue to expand their borders next year. Carlos Sainz is still active.

There are sports and sports. Not everyone demands the physical and mental demands of facing the dunes of the Dakar Rally. Or maybe it’s easier based on the record of another athlete, more precisely in the hands of driver Josef Macháček, who at the age of almost 65 (he was 64 years and 8 months old) won the championship of this race in the light car category. It was the year 2021. Will Carlos Sainz make it through? That record was already achieved by Oscar Swahn in the archery discipline at the Olympic Games. He was the same age of 64 years and 8 months. It was the year 1912. Different times and another slower sport, but that is not an obstacle to highlight his success.

Both are numerically older than Carlos Sainz, which is also the case with Galen Carter Spencer, who in 1904 was declared the Olympic champion in the archery discipline. A sport that also offers another age challenger in the form of Joshua Millner, Olympic champion in 1908 at the age of 61.

Formula 1, basketball and motorcycles

This exclusive area ends with other great athletes and champions. Sam Snead won the PGA golf tournament in 1965 when he was 52 years and 8 months old. A sport that also requires good physical condition, although not as much as a boxer or a Formula 1 driver. We think of Bernard Hopkins (champion at 49 years and 3 months) and Juan Manuel Fangio (at 46 years and 1 month he was declared king of the Great Circus), respectively.

Other age and sports record holders were Dino Zoff (world champion in football at almost 41 years old); Robert Parish (NBA champion at 43); Tom Brady (won the NFL at the age of 43) or Fergus Anderson, winner of the world championship in motorcycling, in his top category, at the age of 44. Several demonstrations that biological age is a simple number. A model of the human being’s ability to self-improve.