Jack LaLanne Turns 90 Today!!

[Tim Wescott]

The original fitness guru,Jack LaLanne turns 90 years yourng today!!

Happy birthday Jack!

[MikeLifts659]

What a great guy! I remember watching my Mom do exercises in the living room watching his show on our small black and white television.

By the way, the juicer he sells is excellent. My wife and I love it.

[Troyster]

No sh*t? 90... Thanks Tim, now I feel old

T

[MikeLifts659]

Troyster said:

No sh*t? 90... Thanks Tim, now I feel old

T

I really feel old considering I watched the original show. They have been replaying it on one of the ESPN channels lately.

[ChrisC]

I think every newswire in the US has a story on Jack LaLanne today, he certainly deserves the plaudits - still healthy and active at 90 is a heck of an acheivement.

Jack LaLanne, still chiseled

FADS COME AND GO, BUT THEN THERE'S THE ORIGINAL FITNESS GURU

By Mark Emmons

Mercury News

MORRO BAY - Jack LaLanne, America's first TV fitness guru, is posing for a photographer. At the direction of his wife, Elaine, LaLanne lifts barbells, does bench presses, performs abdominal exercises.

He doesn't breathe hard, break a sweat or even look tired, which isn't bad for a man who turns 90 -- yes, 90 -- on Sunday.

But there are limits even for this ageless bundle of energy, and there is a trick Elaine doesn't want Jack to attempt.

``Until last year, I was still jumping up into his arms for the cameras,'' said Elaine, who at 78 appears to be in just as good shape as her rock-solid husband. ``But I don't want him to hurt his back.''

LaLanne, though, is not one to back down from a challenge. This is a guy who, on his 70th birthday, towed 70 boats carrying 70 people in the Long Beach Harbor while shackled and handcuffed.

He beckons his wife. She lightly jumps into his arms -- and he easily catches Elaine, holding her like a man carrying his new bride.

``Why didn't you think I could do that?'' LaLanne said after putting her down. ``You don't even weigh 120 pounds.''

Yes, Jack LaLanne is still going strong.

Before Richard Simmons, the Atkins and South Beach diets, the ThighMaster and countless other fitness gadgets, there was the jumpsuit-wearing LaLanne. From 1951 to 1984, he urged millions of viewers to get off the couch and do a few sit-ups.

LaLanne still is living what he preaches. He gets up at 5 a.m. every day at his home on 3 1/2 acres of Central Coast foothill property and works out for two hours -- first in one of their two gyms and then swimming laps. He does not eat meat or products containing white flour or white sugar.

And he patiently answers the same questions about the secret to a long, healthful life.

``I work at it,'' LaLanne said. ``Most people work at dying. I work at living. It's a pain in the ass. You have to eat right and exercise. Most people, when they reach a certain age, let down and talk about what they used to do. Well, who gives a damn about what you used to do? It's what you're doing now.''

In fact, he's enjoying a pop-culture comeback thanks to ESPN Classic, which is running black-and-white episodes of ``The Jack LaLanne Show'' twice each weekday morning. But the reason LaLanne remains synonymous with good health is because, frankly, he's still alive.

``The great thing about Jack LaLanne is that because he's lived so long, he's the only guy who really has the credentials,'' said Robert Thompson, director of Syracuse University's Center for the Study of Popular Television. ``He can say, `Look at all the stuff I told you to do. Now I'm 90 years old. Enough said.' The subtext is that if all those other people had listened to him, they'd be coming to his 90th birthday party.''

There have been concessions to time. LaLanne's thatch of dark hair has thinned and gone gray. He walks gingerly. Still, he claims to feel better than ever.

``I've got no aches and no pains,'' he said. ``If I get a sniffle, it's gone the next day. Everything's working. Just look at my wife. She's smiling.''

Spending a few hours with him can be exhausting. Even when he's sitting on a sofa, LaLanne is constantly in motion -- waving his arms to emphasize a point, flexing his biceps, cracking jokes, breaking into song. You would swear he's on a caffeine high, except he never touches the stuff.

It can also be humbling hanging with Jack.

``What do you do to work out?'' LaLanne asked one recent visitor, with a quick check of his arm muscles and a poke to an abdomen that's a few cans short of a six-pack.

``Well, run mostly.''

``You've got to lift weights, too,'' LaLanne said. ``What's your diet like?''

``Uh . . .''

``You should try juicing fruits and vegetables,'' he said. ``We've got a great juicer.''

You might have seen him peddling the Jack LaLanne Power Juicer on TV. Its success is part of the reason LaLanne said he and Elaine are thriving financially. ``We're out-selling George Foreman,'' LaLanne added, referring to the former boxer's popular grill.

Like a savvy politician, LaLanne stays on message. And his conversion from ``sugarholic'' to health fanatic is central to his standing as the Godfather of Fitness.

Born in the East Bay, he spent 10 years of his youth in Bakersfield before the family returned to the Bay Area. LaLanne describes himself as an underweight, troubled teen who dropped out of high school and was plagued by headaches.

Then, at 15, his mother took him to a nutrition lecture at the Oakland Women's City Club. He adopted a sweets-free lifestyle with religious zeal, returned to school, became captain of the Berkeley High football team and made fitness his life's work.

``It all changed for me in one day,'' he said. ``It was like somebody going to a revival meeting and giving himself to Christ, if you believe in that. If something saved your life, wouldn't you be enthusiastic about it?''

LaLanne opened what is believed to be the nation's first health club, in 1936 in Oakland. He invented equipment that is standard issue in gyms today, such as the leg-extension machine. He encouraged people -- including women and seniors -- to lift weights at a time when many doctors believed it was unhealthy.

Even when he was dismissed as, in his words, as ``a laughingstock and charlatan,'' LaLanne kept plugging away.

``I'd be 6-foot-2 if the medical profession hadn't beaten me down for so long,'' said the 5-6 LaLanne.

Doctors, however, now see the world in much the way LaLanne always did. ``He was ahead of his time when it comes to pushing the idea of fitness and weight training,'' said Dr. Ron Davis, an American Medical Association board member.

LaLanne found his true calling as a TV health evangelist -- starting on San Francisco's KGO with his morning fitness program aimed at housewives.

On ESPN Classic, his old shows look campy. A chair is often his only prop, and he's accompanied by organ music. The hyper LaLanne -- his V-shaped torso highlighted by a tight, short-sleeve jumpsuit that reveals ripped biceps -- begs viewers to join him.

``He was perfect for the intimacy of television,'' said Syracuse's Thompson. ``This guy had some of the same stuff that Oprah has and Johnny Carson had: the ability to insinuate themselves in the domestic space of people's lives.''

His TV career had the added bonus of introducing him to Elaine, who worked at KGO.

``I would come into the studio with a cigarette and a bear claw,'' she said. ``He would say, `You need to be eating apples, oranges, bananas, and I wouldn't tell you this if I didn't like you.' But I'd blow a smoke ring in his face.''

LaLanne wore her down -- they have three children, including one each from previous marriages -- and she has been his partner for five decades through thick and thin. OK, in LaLanne's case, it has always been thin.

But despite his relentless efforts, Americans are heavier than ever. One recent study estimated that two-thirds of U.S. adults -- 131 million people -- are overweight. Obesity may in 2005 overtake tobacco as the leading cause of preventable death, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

LaLanne prefers to focus on the people he has helped. But he does reserve scorn for what he considers the health industry's hucksters.

``It makes me sick because so many people are liars and cheats,'' he said. ``People buy their equipment, it doesn't work, and then they quit and think exercise is not for them. All these diets are from crackpots. You've got to have a combination of everything -- fats, sugars, carbohydrates, protein. You need everything in the right proportion. The only way to lose fat is to count calories. There's no shortcuts.''

LaLanne concedes that his own training schedule is extreme. He recommends people work out in moderation -- about 30 minutes a day, three or four times per week. ``You don't have to work out seven days a week. That's stupid,'' he said. ``But it's what I do. I'm a nut. I just want to see how long I can keep this up.''

For years LaLanne talked about swimming underwater from Catalina Island to Los Angeles, about 26 miles, on his 90th birthday. But Elaine threatened to divorce him.

So what will he do Sunday?

``Tow my wife across the bathtub,'' LaLanne said.

[ChrisC]

In his prime 50 years ago (at age 40!)

[MikeLifts659]

That is a great pic Chris.

[Tim Wescott]

For more info on Jack,and more details about his strength feats,check out the Strength And Power Page at the bottom of the forum.

[Tim Wescott]

Another pic of the "Ageless Wonder" Jack LaLanne !!

[GerryT]

He is incredible and ageless. Bet he will be the same at 100! Happy Birthday, jack, and many more!