It can be a bit strange to be 62 and an Olympian. Fellow denizens of the athletes’ village apparently had trouble processing this.
“When people meet me in the village they say, ‘Hey, so what do you do? Are you an official?’ And I say, ‘Well, I’m an athlete.’”
Still, it must be nice to be Andrew Hoy of Australia. He is Tokyo’s oldest medalist, earning a silver and bronze in equestrian (the youngest medalist was 12-year-old Kokona Hiraki of Japan, who won silver in, appropriately enough, skateboarding).
Hoy got bronze in individual eventing, and Australia won silver in team eventing.
An eight-time Olympian, his first appearance was at the Los Angeles Games in 1984, and he earned gold in Barcelona, Spain, in 1992.
He is Australia’s oldest ever medalist. (Laura Kraut, at 55, became the oldest American to win a medal since 1904, taking silver in equestrian team jumping along with Jessica Springsteen, the daughter of Bruce, and McLain Ward.)
“I’m actually grateful people can still say how old I am,’’ he said, “because when I started in the sport I used to be really proud of being the youngest person in the team.”
Middle-age couch potatoes: Go get a horse.
James Wagner contributed reporting.