Reinhold Messner Quotes

You don't dominate any sport when you're over 40.

I think, at 32, you are past your prime as a footballer.

To say a player is past it at 29, 30 isn't right.

Unless you're a vegan freak of nature like Tony Gonzalez, I don't think you can play sports much past your early 30s.

Unlike in my young days I'm not able to eat, drink and sleep tennis.

I can't climb very seriously now but I was a bit of a freak.

We're still living with the old paradigm of age as an arch. That's the old metaphor: You're born, you peak at midlife and decline into decrepitude.

By no means could I play at the level of these kids who play in the NHL now but as 50-year-olds go, I feel really good and I feel blessed that I'm still healthy.

Getting past 30 as a sportsman, the end could be just around the corner.

I'm 56 years old. I like to get out on the court. I continue to try to play the best I can. Obviously, I'm nowhere near where I was when half this age. But I can still hit a pretty decent ball.

A male athlete's peak, I believe, should be somewhere between 26 and 30.

I always said when I was younger that I want to wrestle until I'm 40 or even in the 50s as long as I can still keep doing the same style of wrestling that I do.

I don't have any aspirations to play until I'm 50 years old.

We start to decline as humans and, particularly, as athletes right around 25 years old. If you're real lucky, you might push that to 27 or 28.

I think there is definitely a physical peak for people, and it's probably a little bit later than most people would believe.

Fighters can fight into their 50s. Why not?

I can play until I'm 40. But I won't.

My athleticism will go away some day. I'm gonna be old one of these days, so I'm going to be able to use those post moves.

I boxed till my late 30s, so 47, that's impossible really to be at your best and if you aren't at your best you shouldn't be boxing.

I'll be too old to face a difficult championship as the one in America will surely be.

I'm retiring because my time is up.

But I'll tell you this: When I lose my athleticism, it's time to go.

Every athlete, I think, would like to play forever. They never want to acknowledge that they've lost a step or they can't quite do what they did before.

The things that people do now in sports, you can't even believe. These are complete total athletes. To see what human beings can do in the highest level is amazing.

So many people feel that once you reach a certain age then it's time for you to retire from a sport you love. I don't think that's true at all. I think age should not dictate that.