{"id":4374,"date":"2020-02-25T11:33:54","date_gmt":"2020-02-25T11:33:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/?p=4374"},"modified":"2020-03-10T09:25:23","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T09:25:23","slug":"olympian-and-irish-champion-of-champions-still-challenging-his-body-at-85","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/your-later-life\/olympian-and-irish-champion-of-champions-still-challenging-his-body-at-85\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympian and Irish \u2018Champion of Champions\u2019 still challenging his body at 85"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div style=\"background-color:#f2f2f2;color:#32373c\" class=\"wp-block-atomic-blocks-ab-profile-box round ab-font-size-14 ab-block-profile ab-profile-columns\"><div class=\"ab-profile-column ab-profile-content-wrap\"><h2 class=\"ab-profile-name\" style=\"color:#32373c\">Ronnie Delaney (pictured)<\/h2><p class=\"ab-profile-title\" style=\"color:#32373c\">Ex Olympic Runner<\/p><div class=\"ab-profile-text\"><\/div><ul class=\"ab-social-links\"><\/ul><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><em>At 84, you can be forgiven for slowing down a bit. Ronnie Delaney does all he can to make sure life doesn\u2019t grind to a halt, however. With swimming now keeping him in shape \u2013 he urges people to find something they can still do to keep them improving and moving.  <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n\n\n\n<p>84 year-old Ronnie \u2018Ron\u2019 Delany &#8211; a poster boy of\nIrish athletics, since his 1500m Olympic Gold at the 1958 Melbourne Summer\nGames &#8211; strikes a balance that seldom few athletes manage. Delaney remains both\nhumble and proud of what he\u2019s achieved, in his long and varied life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since winning gold, the permeating pleasures in\nhis life have been friendship, family and looking after his body. In short, Delaney\nis content with his lot \u2013 an outlook that is infectious to those lucky enough\nto meet him. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Family and friends\nin later life<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI married a very lovely lady, Joan, who\u2019s looked after me so wonderfully. Four beautiful children and eleven wonderful grandchildren followed. What has money or fame to do with anything when you have that?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But as much\nas Ron\u2019s everyday is enriched by the friends and family, great age does bring\nwith it the inevitable realities of health issues and preparing to lose those\naround you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Anyone out there struggling along, just get it checked out \u2013 there\u2019s so much they can do for you now.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI look\naround those I\u2019ve come to know through running or business; we\u2019re slowly\npopping off one by one &#8211; we\u2019re in the departure lounge!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His own\nhealth has been predominantly good. Indeed, he was 70 before having to admit\ndefeat and give playing certain sports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Health\nand fitness in later life<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cUntil I\nwas about 70, I played regular tennis and squash. I also played golf \u2013 despite\nbeing no good at it. The ability to do those things does pass, but latterly I\nfound swimming which is still a lifeblood to me today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nimportance of taking responsibility for his own body is a priority for Delaney.\nBack in the day, he maintained his body as any athlete would \u2013 and continues to\ndo so now. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhen I was\n69, I got a pain in my groin playing tennis and thought \u2018oh god I\u2019ve tweaked my\ngroin\u2019. What actually was going on was degeneration in my hip and I had to\neventually have it replaced.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Swimming keeps\nhim as strong and flexible as possible now. However, sometimes even Ronnie\nDelaney has to take a break. When his eyes started causing him some problems,\nhe went to the doctor to get himself checked out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>\u201cAnyone\nout there struggling along, just get it checked out\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve only\njust had a cataract operation last month! I almost forgot to tell you! I was\ngetting blinded by car lights coming towards me and thought I\u2019d better get it seen\nto. The specialist said \u2018this is what you\u2019ve got and we can sort it out\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cA week later\nit\u2019s done. It\u2019s brilliant, I can\u2019t believe the difference in colour and my\ndistance sight has improved massively. Anyone out there struggling along, just\nget it checked out \u2013 there\u2019s so much they can do for you now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Looking\nafter yourself and indeed knowing when a certain activity might be too much for\nyou is key, according to Delaney. But maintaining movement and activity \u2013 just\nfinding something that you <em>can <\/em>still do \u2013 is even more vital to staving\noff some of age\u2019s less appealing declines. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At 84, you can be forgiven for slowing down a bit. Ronnie Delaney does all he can to make sure life doesn\u2019t grind to a halt, however. With swimming now keeping him in shape \u2013 he urges people to find something they can still do to keep them improving and moving. 84 year-old Ronnie \u2018Ron\u2019 &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/your-later-life\/olympian-and-irish-champion-of-champions-still-challenging-his-body-at-85\/\">Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":4416,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4048],"tags":[4489],"class_list":["post-4374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-your-later-life","tag-your-later-life-2020"],"acf":[],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com\/cdn-site.mediaplanet.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/94\/2020\/02\/07211255\/RONNIE-DELANY-FRONT-COVER-IMAGE-600x400.jpg","featured_image_src_square":"https:\/\/s3.eu-north-1.amazonaws.com\/cdn-site.mediaplanet.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/94\/2020\/02\/07211255\/RONNIE-DELANY-FRONT-COVER-IMAGE-600x600.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"Health Awareness","author_link":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/author\/jennyhyndman\/"},"vicky_index_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4374"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4374\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4464,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4374\/revisions\/4464"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthnews.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}