The Osage Nation executive branch on Oct. 28 celebrated the completion of the first phase of the development south of Main Street in downtown Pawhuska of a new outdoor health complex.

The complex is located between Lynn Avenue on the east and Kihekah Avenue on the west. It stretches along what once was a depot site for the Midland Valley Railroad. A new concrete walking trail forms a perimeter for it. Pickleball courts, as well as fitness equipment and courses, are available for free public use. Publicly accessible parking is available on three sides.

Casey Johnson, secretary of Development for the Osage Nation, said during the ribbon-cutting ceremony that future additions to the complex are expected to include sports fields. The loop of walking trail will offer safety from motor vehicle traffic to persons walking to lose weight or achieve other health-related goals, he said. Johnson shared that he recently needed to lose weight and ended up walking along public streets, one result of which was that he was nearly run over more than once.

Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear said the continued development of the exercise complex will require additional political and financial support. The Osage Nation executive branch established the facility without the backing of the Osage Nation Congress. Ribbon cuttings for new Osage Nation amenities typically feature recognition for members of Congress, but that was missing Oct. 28.

“We’re working on it every day,” Standing Bear said regarding additional backing for the exercise complex. Standing Bear is in his third four-year term as principal chief and has been an energetic proponent of expanding health, education and housing services.

“It’s real. It’s really happening,” Standing Bear said regarding the exercise complex. “You see, I’ve got to exercise.”

Johnson said that the idea for the new complex came from Osage Nation executive branch deliberations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“One of the things we talked about was getting people healthy,” Johnson said. Survey work was done regarding the health of people in Osage County and the results were disturbing, he said.

“And they found that the farther away from Osage County you get, the healthier you get,” Johnson said.

MONDAY, Nov. 4, 2024 (HealthDay News) — There’s just something about sitting.

New research shows that too much time on sofas and chairs harms the heart — even among people who get the minimum recommended amount of daily exercise.

“Taking a quick walk after work may not be enough” to offset the health dangers of sitting, said study lead author Chandra Reynolds. She’s a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

Her team published its findings recently in the journal PLOS One.

The data comes from an ongoing study of over a thousand former or current Coloradans, 730 of who are twins. Reynolds’ team focused on participants aged 28 to 49.

Study lead author Ryan Bruellman said the cohort was relatively young, because “young adults tend to think they are impervious to the impacts of aging. But what you do during this critical time of life matters.”

Bruellman is now a PhD candidate at the University of California, Riverside.

A lot of the participants were sitting a lot of the time: An average of almost nine hours per day, according to the study.

Exercise rates ranged from 80 and 160 minutes of moderate physical activity per week and less than 135 minutes of vigorous exercise weekly. 

The Boulder team then assessed each person’s “heart age” using two key heart health indicators: total cholesterol/high-density lipoprotein and body mass index (BMI).

The result: As sitting time increased, heart aging did, too.

Even when folks met minimum daily exercise recommendations — about 20 minutes per day of “moderate” exercise — the deleterious effect to the heart of all that sitting didn’t budge.

Adding in “vigorous” exercise (for example, running or cycling) for about 30 or more minutes per day did seem to help counteract the harms from sitting, however. But it still didn’t bring those harms back to zero.

According to a news release from the university, data from the twins in the study suggests that “replacing sitting with exercise seemed to work better to improve cholesterol than simply adding exercise to a full day of sitting.”

The researchers’ suggestions for folks who sit a lot: Try using a standing desk at work, get in at least 30 minutes of vigorous exercise per day or add in strenuous workouts on your days off as a “weekend warrior.”

More information

Find out more about the health dangers of sitting at Johns Hopkins University.

SOURCE: University of Colorado Boulder, news release, Nov. 1, 2024

David and Gioia Berry aren’t your typical octogenarians.

Rather than travelling the world, the 81-year-olds have opted to spend their retirement years breaking world records in fitness competitions.

The pair already have an impressive list of achievements between them.

David currently holds three world records for various indoor rowing events in the men’s 75-to-79-year age category and another for the 100-metre sprint for his 80-84 age group, with a time of 17.9 seconds.

Gioia, on the other hand, recently broke the world record on the SkiErg – short for skiing exercise machine – in the 80-to-84-year age category for 100 metres, clocking 25.5 seconds.

The Gold Coast couple, who have been married for more than 60 years, have no plans of slowing down either.

They’ve spent the past few months training at their local gym and pool for the indoor rowing event at the Pan Pacific Masters Games on the Gold Coast this week.

“I do a split body routine: chest and triceps on a Monday; back and biceps on Wednesdays; and we do legs and arms as well as shoulders on Fridays — so that keeps us pretty busy,” Mr Berry said.

On alternate days, they swim about a kilometre, followed by an ice bath for recovery.

“I used to do yoga and pilates but I can’t fit that in anymore because I’m trying to train for the Pan Pac games,” Mrs Berry said.

Bodybuilding after having kids

Despite their lifelong love for health and fitness, it wasn’t until they were in their late 30s that they decided to take it more seriously by opening a gym and entering body building competitions.

“I was training with weights in the backyard when I was 16 years of age, but I was pretty skinny then,” Mr Berry said.

At 37, Mrs Berry entered the very first Miss Australia bodybuilding competition in 1990.

But Mr Berry said convincing his wife to compete was “a real challenge”.

“She was horrified but like a true champion she bit the bullet and lined up for the comp and did very well,” he said.

“She placed fourth out of about 25 girls, most of them aged between 19 and 22 … but she got the Most Outstanding Achievement Award.”

Mr Berry entered his first bodybuilding competition about a year later at 39 and won the masters category for his age group in the Mr Australia contest.

He ended up going on to become the first person to also win the 50s, 60s and 70-year age categories.

Mr Berry says despite being prone to injuries these days, he hopes they’ll be able to continue doing what they love together.

“So far, the future is looking good as we both are still breaking records in our age categories and certainly hope we can continue for a while yet,” he said.

‘Never too late to start exercising’

Bond University academic Kieran Le Plastrier says the couple are proof that it’s never too late to start exercising.

“It turns out the literature is pretty good in that it reminds us that even if we don’t make changes till our 30s, 40s or 50s … the things we do in our 40s can make a huge difference into our older age and even into advanced age, which is anybody over 80 years of age,” Dr Le Plastrier said.

He encourages older people to prioritise resistance training, like lifting weights, because it reduces the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and falls.

“So what I would encourage us to all take away from this story is that no matter when we start, as long as we get started, we can improve our health outcomes into old age.”