Oksana Chusovitina might not be the teenage olympic gymnast we often see, but you better believe she can — and will — compete with the best of them. Last Sunday, the 40-year-old from Uzbekistan qualified for the 2016 Summer Olympic games.
This will be Chusovitina's seventh time at the Olympics since her first appearance in 1992, when she helped the USSR team win the gold. Chusovitina's career has spanned over two decades, which is unheard of in the gymnastics world. The average age of an Olympic gymnast is 16, and most female gymnasts are likely to retire when they hit their 20s. With two individual gold medals and 11 World Championship medals already under her belt, Chusovitina's résumé is beyond impressive. But why stop there?
"Am I old? I don’t feel old," she told the New York Times in 2012, adding, "Gymnastics keeps me young."
Watch her in action in the video below from Fox Sports, and start counting the days until Rio. By then, she'll be 41, making her the oldest female Olympic gymnast of all time — and our new hero.
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