Could this 93-year-old sprinter's muscles hold clues to healthy aging?
uncertain
muscles → hold → aging
Scientists think so
Emma Mazzenga got back into running in her 50s.
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Mazzenga → think → 50s
Forty years later, she's as fit as when she started
At 93, Emma Maria Mazzenga still gets the jitters before a race.
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Mazzenga → start → race
"On race day, I'm very tense," she said.
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she → say → day
"People ask to interview me, and I tell them: Don't come near me until I've run."
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I → ask → me
Over the last four decades, Mazzenga has won 11 world titles, 31 European championships and 115 Italian races.
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Mazzenga → win → titles
She currently holds the 200-metre world record in the women's over-90 category: 50.33 seconds, set in 2024, when she was 91.
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she → hold → 2024
Now she is giving scientists a rare look at just how much of the physical decline we associate with aging may not actually be inevitable.
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we → give → aging
Mazzenga ran as a university student in Padua, in northern Italy.
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Mazzenga → run → Italy
She then stopped for three decades while she taught high school biology and raised two children, largely on her own after her husband died.
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husband → stop → own
In 1986, when she was 53, the president of her old university running club rounded up former athletes for the growing field of masters competitions, for those over age 35.
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president → round → age
"One by one, my friends quit," she said.
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she → quit → one
"I kept going."
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I → keep → ?
In this 2024 file photo, a then-90-year-old Mazzenga shows her membership card for the Italian Athletics Federation, ahead of a race in San Biagio di Callalta, Italy.
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Mazzenga → show → Callalta
It shows her birthdate: Aug. 1, 1933.
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It → show → birthdate
She still trains three times a week, mostly short repeats of 50 to 200 metres.
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She → train → metres
Slow jogging bores her.
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jogging → bore → her
What drives her isn't winning, Mazzenga said.
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Mazzenga → drive → her
In Italy, she has no rivals in her age category.
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she → have → category
"I come first because I have to.
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I → come → ?
I'm the only one," she said.
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she → say → ?
"I can't get any emotion out of that.
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I → get → that
So she races the clock instead.
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she → race → clock
"If I win with a mediocre time, it gives me no satisfaction."
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it → win → satisfaction
Her proudest moment is still her first world title, the 400-metre W75 race at the World Masters Athletics Championships in Sacramento, Calif., won in 2011.
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moment → win → 2011
I found myself alone on the podium," Mazzenga recalled.
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Mazzenga → find → podium
But eventually, her performances drew a different audience: Scientists.
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performances → draw → audience
Two years ago, Antonio La Torre, a scientist at the University of Milan and technical director of Italy’s athletic federation, tipped off two researchers who were studying how the body ages.
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body → tip → researchers
"We were told there was this woman who was able to run 200 metres in a very short time," said Martino Franchi, an associate professor of human physiology at the University of Padua.
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Franchi → tell → Padua
Mazzegna became the most extreme case in a broader, two-year project called Trajector-Age, which tracked how muscles, nerves, heart and metabolism change in people over 50 to see whether exercise can slow decline.
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exercise → become → decline
Researchers from several Italian universities and the University of Wisconsin-Madison put Mazzenga through a gruelling cycling test and took biopsies from her thigh.
Mazzenga, then 90, competes in the 100-metre W90 category race in San Biagio di Callalta, Italy, on May 4, 2024. (Remo Casilli/Reuters)
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Mazzenga → put → May
Franchi says Mazzenga's maximal oxygen consumption is comparable to that of someone in their 50s.
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consumption → say → 50s
Also known as a VO2 max, it represents the greatest amount of oxygen a body can take in and use — a key measure of cardiovascular fitness.
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body → know → fitness
"And she's 90," he said.
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he → say → ?
The bigger surprise was inside her muscles, said Franchi.
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Franchi → say → muscles
Mazzenga has lost some of the fast-twitch fibres used for explosive movement, although fewer than expected.
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Mazzenga → lose → movement
But her slow-twitch fibres — the ones that resist fatigue — are extraordinary.
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that → resist → fatigue
"They are as big as a girl in her 20s," he said.
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he → say → 20s
Martino Franchi gestures toward a screen showing a microscopic view of muscle fibres at his lab at the University of Padua, in Italy.
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Franchi → gesture → Italy
Researchers think those unusually large fibres may help her hold her pace and compensate, at least partly, for the fast fibres lost with age.
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fibres → think → age
…and 30 more, not listed.
The Aporia
