A bit after the Covid pandemic, and associated lockdowns, started, I began - VERY gradually, with due concern about protecting my back) - lifting weights. (With the bars and honky-tonks shuttered, I needed something to do...) Looking on-line, based on my age and weight, I'm still rated at novice level on deadlifts, but (for reasons I cannot imagine) close to elite level on the one-arm dumbbell row.
Kind of thinking, should I ever retire, that a bit of competition might be fun. Not thinking seriously, but something to conjure with.
One inducement to such is that one generally competes within age brackets, so I wouldn't have to go up against a buff 25-year old.
If I had sense, I'd avoid stepping into the current culture wars, but if one cannot do so in one's own personal blog, where can one?
Seems to me that, in various athletic competitions, we categorize by age for reasons similar to our categorizing by gender. As I have different obstacles facing me than does the above referenced 25-year old, so does a biological female face different obstacles than does a male, for instance in sports involving upper body bone and musculature.
As I would not want to face said 25-year old simply because he really, really believes he's 70, so would (I imagine) a female weight lifter not want to face a male - even if he really, really wants to be a female.
Perhaps Mark Twain put it best: "If I call my dog's tail a leg, does that mean that I own a 5-legged dog? Clearly not. Calling the tail a leg does not make it so."
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