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Comment by bluedevil2k | Hacker News Reader

He's found the best way to live an extended life - be rich. He has access to health care and doctors most people can't afford & preventative tests that typical insurance doesn't cover. Of course, just because you have access to that type of health care, doesn't mean you take advantage of it - Warren Buffett famously put off his colorectal exams forever, nearly costing him dearly.

The other aspect of this article that I wanted to see was whether he's chosen to use hormone replacement - it says "he's ripped. His arms are guns. His abs come in a pack" and later "Losing muscle to age clearly spooks him". Those are all nice, but seemingly biophysically impossible for a 77 year old man.

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Your data doesn't support your claim unless you mean that you can extend life into your 80's.

As for working out, consider the workout guru Jack LaLanne who managed to live to 96.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_LaLanne

Of course, his brother Norman lived to be 97.

I don't know, my grandfather now pasted away in his 70s could run a mile faster than me back in my teens and I could run the mile in just under 5 minutes. We used to race at the track. He lived until he was 91. The reality is you can be pretty active and enjoy life well into your 80s but it only takes one thing to go wrong at that age for pretty much everything to stop. He has a stomach issue where is large intestine just burst... this by itself does not kill someone today - medicine is very good, but eventually it's the lack of nutrients and the body just takes forever to heal itself that eventually will catch up to all of us... The most promising thing I've read about with this regard is the gdf11 discovery by the scientists at Harvard - but like any discovery... there's a lot probably missing from it... at any rate, exercising is without a doubt a good thing, but eventually our bodies will just fall apart... literally.

Not that it contradicts the point you are making, but the world (recorded) mile record for a 70 year old male is just under 5:20. (or 4:53 for the 1500m) http://www.world-masters-athletics.org/records/outdoor-men

(Irrelevant, but I added the 1500m time for people not familiar with mile times. But actually this mile record was set in the Netherlands, while the 1500m record was set in California. :P )

The "seemingly impossible" is important. The way human bodies adapt to progressive overload weight lifting does not change that much whether you're 8 years old or 80. Being lean is 90% diet. It's just that 99% of people are not willing to make the choices required to carve out the Adonis & Venus that's inside us all.

You're right. Although it's likely he may live an extended life due to genes, his parents passed in their 90's, he's living the latter years the best way possible, by being rich.

And it's reasonable to think his wealth is buying "power packs", like hormone replacement, that he'd rather not see in the press.

Certainly genetics are part of this as you say his parents both lived to 94 and 98.

But I would say what may help him live longer than his genetics would allow is the consistency of his health care.

Being rich allows him the luxury of health care, I think this is the biggest factor helping him and being able to eat well i.e. good quality food which is expensive. Even though here in Canada we have socialized medicine and at times it sucks at least it's consistent in that we have the care available. For small problems or major ones it's the daily availability of being able to get help and not waiting until it's too late due to lack of coverage or money to pay a doctor.

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