Limits in endurance performance of octogenarian athletes

Abstract

TO THE EDITOR: A recent study of Trappe et al. (3) showed that the aerobic power of octogenarian lifelong endurance athletes was approximately double that of untrained octogenarians (38 vs. 21 ml·kg 1 ·min 1 ). These remarkable aerobic capacities are the highest ever recorded in this age group. However, the impact of the identified physiological capacities on actual endurance performances has not been addressed, as no running performance indicators of the octogenarian athletes were provided in this study. We hereby suggest that, although trained octogenarian athletes can achieve levels of aerobic fitness well above their untrained counterpart, as a group they actually have not yet reached their limits of endurance performance. During the past decades, masters athletes (40 yr of age) have dramatically improved their performance in endurance events such as marathon running. An analysis of performances at the New York City Marathon during the 1980 –2010 period showed that running times of the best male masters runners between 65 and 79 years of age decreased significantly (2). However, due to the low rate of participation of athletes older than 80 years, the performances of octogenarian finishers were not analyzed. The current marathon world record for a male octogenarian athlete was set in 2011 at the Toronto marathon by a Canadian athlete (Ed Whitlock, age 80) who ra n3h1 5 min 54 s(http://