Grinning mischievously, Juanjo Urbizu donned a baseball cap, tucked his T-shirt neatly into his sweatpants and adjusted the straps on his elbow pads before positioning his skateboard on the bowl’s edge, ready for the “drop.”
Urbizu’s attempt at a gnarly trick drew stares, because the athlete is a sight to behold, wheeling around the unassuming skate park in northern Spain having just turned 88.
For the cheerful octogenarian, each skating session begins by carefully clearing the square bowl of pebbles to guarantee a smooth ride.
Photo: Reuters
“My bones are special,” he said with a chuckle, between sips on a post-workout glass of white wine at his favorite bar in Bilbao’s working-class Begona neighborhood. “Though I touch wood.”
In a rapidly aging country, where more than half the population is older than 44, the demographic shift is increasingly becoming a topic of national debate.
However, Spain’s generally warm climate is conducive to outdoor activities and studies have proven the importance of physical exercise in bettering the quality of life and reducing the risk of disease for the elderly.
Urbizu took up skateboarding aged 70, partly because it was cheaper than his beloved snow sports.
He said the sport offers an escape from monotony.
“By breaking the routine, you bring something new to everyday life, and that gives you a sense of rest,” he said.
For people his age considering taking up skateboarding, he advises they do it little by little.
“Falls here are truly bad, much worse than in the snow. Anyone who does something like this should wear full protection,” he said.
The Philadelphia 76ers, fueled by 36 points from Tyrese Maxey and a triple-double from Joel Embiid, on Thursday beat the Houston Rockets 128-122 in an NBA overtime thriller. Cameroonian big man Embiid scored 32 points, grabbed 15 rebounds and handed out 10 assists, posting the ninth triple-double of his career to help the Sixers end the Rockets’ three-game winning streak. Rockets star Kevin Durant scored 36 points and Amen Thompson added 17, but Thompson was scoreless in the fourth quarter. Even so, the Rockets led by nine midway through the final frame, Maxey tying it at 115-115 with 40.1 seconds left. Durant missed a
Tobias Harris on Monday scored 25 points as the Detroit Pistons held off the Boston Celtics to score a 104-103 victory in their top-of-the-table Eastern Conference showdown. Harris was one of four Detroit players to finish in double figures, with Jalen Duren adding 18 points and point guard Cade Cunningham scoring 16 points with 14 assists. The win sees Detroit extend their lead at the top of the Eastern Conference to 31-10, 5.5 games ahead of second-placed Boston, who fell to 26-16 with the defeat. Jaylen Brown led the Celtics scoring with 32 points and almost snatched victory in the
The Milwaukee Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo on Friday said that he will probably be out for an extended period after hurting his right calf again after a similar injury caused him to miss eight games earlier this season. Antetokounmpo had his right calf wrapped in the first half of their 102-100 loss to the Denver Nuggets. He did not appear comfortable the rest of the night and left for good with 34 seconds remaining. “At the end, I could not move no more, so I had to stop playing,” Antetokounmpo said. The two-time NBA Most Valuable Player said he expected to undergo an MRI
The chaotic scenes which tarnished Sunday’s Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) final will forever overshadow a tournament that had until that point been a great success for hosts Morocco, on and off the pitch. Everything appeared set up for Walid Regragui’s Morocco side to cement their status as Africa’s preeminent footballing force as the continent’s top-ranked team made it to the final against Senegal in Rabat. Home advantage unquestionably brought extra pressure on the 2022 FIFA World Cup semi-finalists, but it also perhaps played into their hands for the controversial penalty award at the end of normal time in the
RSS