Disclosure: This article may contain affiliate links. If you decide to make a purchase, I may make a small commission at no extra cost to you.

There are many centenarians in the UK, but Fauja stands out from the rest. When he was over 100 years old he was able to run the London Marathon! An amazing accomplishment at any age, but even more so for someone who has been alive for over a century.

He holds many different records for similar feats of endurance, according to his Wikipedia page. Many of us would love to be able to accomplish something like this in our senior years.

Who is Fauja Singh?

Fauja Singh was born on the 1st of April 1911. He is part of the Sikh community in the UK and is of Punjabi Indian descent.

I’ve been following Fauja Singh for quite a few years now. I first saw him on a TV Documentary when he took part in the London Marathon. On the TV program, he described his diet, and it’s clear that he’s been practicing calorie restriction for many years.

On Wikipedia, it says that Mr. Singh is 5 ft 8″ tall and weighs just 115 lbs. So, he is very lean, but this is probably a result of expending lots of energy running and aging itself, not just CR.

CR Slows Down Muscle Aging

It’s been shown in rodents and rhesus monkeys that a CR diet preserves muscle mass and function with age.

Therefore, it’s likely that Mr. Singh has benefited from the anti-aging effect of his diet and that’s why he’s able to be so incredibly active even in his old age.

In biopsies taken from people practicing long-term calorie restriction (age 58 ± 7.4), the gene expression profile of their muscles was found to be more similar to 30-year-old controls.

Maintaining big muscles requires a lot of calories, and this can accelerate the rate of aging. So, while practicing calorie restriction does lead to a lower muscle mass (depending on the severity of restriction), it is able to preserve the muscle you have, as well as maintain its ability to function in a youthful way for decades longer than normal.

Fauja Singh Diet Plan

Fauja Singh believes that the reason he has lived so long is that he abstains from both smoking and alcohol, and he follows a vegetarian diet. He tries to include a lot of fresh foods in his diet and limits his consumption of processed foods.

In the BBC interview that was aired, he told the reporter that he ate only a child’s size portion of food.

This means that he is practicing calorie restriction, which has been known to prolong lifespan and it seems to be paying off for him.

Fauja Singh is a great example to follow!

I respect people like Fauja a lot. He has tried to live the best he could given the circumstances, and has bravely faced hard things in his life and embraced the future. He is a strong person who desires to live life and does not want to slow down any time soon!

I follow a similar lifestyle to Faujua Singh: I don’t drink alcohol, I’ve never smoked, and for most of my life I’ve been active and practiced calorie restriction since I was 18 years old.

I’ve also been vegetarian since 2007, and a vegan since 2012. I’ll likely stick to a vegan diet for the foreseeable future for health and ethical reasons.

I hope I can be in great shape like Fauja when I reach 100 years old. Actually, I hope to reach the 22nd century, which would make me very old. By then, I think it’s very possible we’ll have ways to reverse aging.

Many people today in their 60s and 70s are not able to do what this man has accomplished, but I think that more people could, if they followed this way of life.

Some people say: “it’s genes” but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Most of how we age will come down to lifestyle, not genetics that we inherited from our parents.

People underestimate how much of an impact diet and exercise can have.

Remember that the choices you make today are important for your health decades from now. Make the right choices and be the best person you can be.

Finally, I recommend joining his Facebook page to keep up to date with what he’s up to.

Check out the following videos with Fauja Singh

References

1. Calorie restriction in humans inhibits the PI3K/AKT pathway and induces a younger transcription profile

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3714316/

Article reviewed and updated: March 2019.