The short answer: Most older adults don't stop playing the sports they love because of age. More often, they stop because they lose the leg strength, balance and power those activities require. Progressive strength training can rebuild those abilities at any age. Lilla came back from a hip fracture at 80 and a tibia and fibula fracture at 84 to compete internationally in alpine ski racing, and at 87 she is training for the 2028 Winter World Master Games.
Many older adults eventually stop skiing, golfing, playing tennis, pickleball, hiking, cycling, or doing the activities they enjoy. It is rarely because they lose interest. More often, they stop after a hip replacement, a hip fracture, a knee replacement, a fall, or a new diagnosis. Others simply begin believing they are "too old" to continue.
The movements their sport requires start feeling harder. Confidence fades, and a fear of falling or getting hurt gradually replaces the enjoyment they once felt. Believing these changes are simply part of aging, many lower their expectations, participate less often, and eventually stop altogether.
Leg strength is the foundation for almost everything we want to keep doing as we age. Whether the goal is skiing, golfing, hiking, pickleball, climbing stairs, or simply getting out of a chair with confidence, every activity depends on having enough strength to meet its physical demands. When leg strength declines, those activities become harder, not because of age itself, but because the muscles can no longer support them.
Growing older doesn't mean giving up the sports you love
This decline has a name: sarcopenia, the gradual loss of muscle mass and power that comes with age. Muscle strength and power tend to build until around age 30 to 35, then decline slowly at first before accelerating in the mid-sixties and seventies. That is why leg strength does not just quietly fade over the decades; without ongoing training, it can drop off noticeably once that threshold hits.
The encouraging news is that leg strength can improve at any age. Whether the goal is skiing, golfing, hiking, tennis, pickleball, or simply keeping up with grandchildren, stronger legs make those activities safer, easier and more enjoyable.
Don't let age or an injury decide your future
Many older adults hear the same message after a serious injury, surgery, or new diagnosis: maybe it's time to give that up. Sometimes the advice comes from family members who worry about another injury. Sometimes it comes from friends who assume growing older means slowing down. Eventually, many older adults begin believing it themselves, and give up not because they can no longer participate, but because they no longer believe it's possible.
Age alone doesn't determine what someone is capable of doing. Neither does a hip fracture, a joint replacement, or many medical diagnoses. What matters more is whether a person has the leg strength, balance, power, mobility and confidence their activity requires, and for many older adults, those physical abilities can improve with progressive training, expert guidance and time.
Walking isn't enough
Many older adults are told to just keep walking. Walking is excellent for cardiovascular health, but it doesn't build the leg strength required for most sports or many everyday activities. Sports demand leg strength, balance, power, agility, coordination, quick reactions and confidence, and exercise helps keep someone active while progressive leg-strength training prepares them to continue doing the activities they love.
Meet Lilla: proof that age doesn't define what's possible
When Lilla was 80, she wasn't slowing down. She competed in alpine ski racing, including Super-G, Giant Slalom and Slalom, water skied, hiked Minnesota's North Shore, played tennis, kayaked, gardened, and embraced every opportunity to stay active outdoors.
Looking at Lilla, few people would have guessed the challenges she had overcome to continue living such an active life. More than 15 years earlier, she underwent surgery to remove a brain tumor. Although the tumor wasn't life-threatening, the surgery permanently changed the way her body functioned. She lost much of the feeling in her legs, feet and trunk and spent more than a year relearning how to sit, stand, walk and move. Even after her recovery, she continued living with chronic pain and significant morning stiffness, making daily stretching and exercise an essential part of her routine.
For many people, those challenges would have marked the end of an active lifestyle. For Lilla, they became another obstacle to overcome. She refused to let a diagnosis determine what she could no longer do, and instead chose to keep moving forward.
Continuing to participate takes work
Lilla's active lifestyle wasn't the result of good luck or good genetics. It was the result of years of consistently building and maintaining the physical abilities the activities she loved required. Because of the permanent loss of sensation in her legs, feet and trunk, she fell frequently, sometimes every week. She would simply get back up, smile, say "oh well," and keep going.
Then, while competing in an alpine ski race, she sustained a hip fracture. Many people would have accepted an injury like that as a sign it was time to stop skiing. Lilla saw it differently. Her goal wasn't simply to heal; it was to regain the leg strength, balance and confidence needed to return to an active lifestyle.
Preparing for the Winter World Master Games
Before her hip fracture, Lilla had already been exercising with Tandem Strength & Balance. During ski season she took a break from her sessions to focus on alpine ski racing. Then, during a race, she fractured her hip. When she returned, her focus was no longer on the next competition. It was on rebuilding the strength needed to climb stairs, get on and off the floor, and regain her independence. Those functional milestones became the foundation for everything that followed.
Only after rebuilding those everyday skills could her exercise program shift toward the physical demands of alpine ski racing. Then she surprised her Tandem therapists: she announced she wanted to compete in the Winter World Master Games in Innsbruck, Austria. From that point, every session was designed to help her return to competitive ski racing.
About a year later, Lilla competed in the Winter World Master Games. During that year, she attended twice-weekly, one-on-one exercise sessions while also committing to her own daily stretching and exercise routine at home. Together, those efforts helped her rebuild the strength, balance, power and confidence needed to return to alpine ski racing. Her program emphasized building the leg strength needed for everyday mobility, climbing stairs safely, getting on and off the floor independently, improving balance despite reduced sensation in her legs, feet and trunk, developing the leg power alpine ski racing requires, improving quick reactions and control on the slopes, and restoring the confidence needed to compete internationally. Every session built on the one before it.
The comeback didn't end there
Lilla returned to international competition and won multiple medals, including a gold medal. For many people, that would have been the perfect ending. But Lilla wasn't finished. Four years later, at age 84, she returned to compete in the Winter World Master Games again. Getting back there required overcoming another major setback: while competing in an alpine ski race, she sustained a tibia and fibula fracture. Once again, she followed the same progression, rebuilding everyday function before returning to the advanced demands of competitive skiing.
Adding to the challenge, Lilla was struggling with severe knee pain and had already scheduled a total knee replacement for two months after returning home from the Winter World Master Games. Most people would have postponed the goal, or decided it was finally time to retire from competitive skiing. Lilla chose differently. She continued exercising, traveled internationally, and competed once again.
Today, nearly nine years after beginning her journey with Tandem Strength & Balance and as she approaches her 86th birthday, Lilla continues exercising twice each week while maintaining her daily home exercise routine. She has no plans to slow down. She is already working toward her next goal: returning to compete in the 2028 Winter World Master Games at 87 years old.
Stronger legs help you continue doing what you love
The activities we love don't disappear because of age. They become harder when we lose the leg strength needed to do them. Whether the goal is skiing another season, hiking with family, golfing, playing pickleball, gardening, or simply walking confidently through the neighborhood, leg strength is the foundation that makes those activities possible.
Lilla's story isn't really about the medals she won. It is about refusing to let age, injury or a diagnosis define what's possible. Lilla's case is extraordinary; few people carry the level of permanent nerve damage and repeated major fractures she has faced. That's exactly the point: if someone managing that much can keep building leg strength and keep competing, most older adults facing far less have every reason to believe they can keep going too.
References
- Soro-García P, González-Gálvez N. Effects of Progressive Resistance Training After Hip Fracture: A Systematic Review. Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology. 2025;10(1):54.
Written by Nicole Rennie, PT, founder of Tandem Strength & Balance®, based on Lilla's own account, shared with her permission. This article is general education, not medical advice for a specific person.