{"id":664408,"date":"2026-03-18T12:37:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T12:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/664408\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T12:37:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T12:37:15","slug":"bollywood-template-of-big-biceps-6-pack-isnt-fitness-living-healthy-is","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/664408\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Bollywood template of big biceps & 6-pack isn\u2019t fitness, living healthy is\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\u2018BollywoodAt 56, ex-cricketer Jonty Rhodes, who now calls Goa home, champions a holistic approach to fitness, emphasizing the importance of sleep, wholesome nutrition, and dynamic activities like surfing and cycling. For Rhodes, the essence of longevity lies in maintaining an active lifestyle that allows for quality time with loved ones, rather than merely counting years. Jonty Rhodes<\/a>, who terrorised Indian cricket fans with his electric fielding, is now half-Indian, with a house in Goa and a daughter named \u2018India\u2019. Still supremely agile at 56, he walks TOI Health+ through his fitness mantrasYou said in one of your interviews: \u2018I can teach a cricketer to catch a ball, but I can\u2019t teach him how to get to the ball to catch it\u2019? You are 56 and still look like you could get to any ball that is up in the air…<\/p>\n

Last year, I played in one of those legends tournaments and I did a diving save at the boundary. My wife was like \u2014 \u2018what were you thinking?\u2019 Flying is not the problem these days, it\u2019s the landing!Jonty Rhodes<\/p>\n

If you were to describe your own fitness, how would you describe it?I think fitness is such a multi-meaning word. For me, it\u2019s about wellness. I can\u2019t run a marathon, but I surf, I cycle, and I love to walk. When I\u2019m back in Cape Town, we go into the mountains. In Goa, we live in a tiny fishing village because that allows the kids to be in the ocean all the time. My fitness is functional. At my age, a lot of it is about mobility. Three things that we focus on as a family to keep fit \u2014 sleep, nutrition and movement. Food is important, obviously, because if you\u2019re not fuelling yourself, if you\u2019re eating a lot of processed food, you\u2019re not helping yourself no matter how hard you\u2019re training. And then sleep \u2014 it\u2019s the cornerstone. We have no TV in Goa and no TV in Cape Town. Evenings are spent reading. We wind down around 8-8.30pm and by 9 pm, the whole family is fast asleep. I am the best sleeper in our family.Tell us about your diet…There is no diet plan. If you are following a diet, then a cheat day is required and that knocks you back. Our kids can eat anything in the house. But when we purchase things, we do it with a clear intent. And the intent is to consume clean, natural, fresh food. We don\u2019t have any sugar in our house. We use honey if we need a sweetener.What about exercise?Again, no training regime. Movement for us is exercise. I\u2019m no longer running. When I retired, I said, that\u2019s it. I\u2019ve been a hockey player, a cricket player. No more running. I have a mountain bike and a surfboard. Surfing is a real workout for me. Surfing builds upper body strength because it involves heavy paddling in the ocean. With the mountain bike, I get my endurance, my cardio. It is always 2-3 hours in the hills. My wife does yoga every day. She is a yoga teacher.What are the three habits you believe make the biggest difference for long-term health after 50?Managing stress is obviously massive. People work really, really hard in India. It\u2019s 5.10 pm and they (referring to the TOI building\u2019s 4th floor in Mumbai, where this conversation happened) look like they\u2019re just checking in. In South Africa, we\u2019re already on the road, going home. I think being out in nature is important. Movement in the outdoors is such an important part of relieving stress. The second important thing after 50 is mobility with strength work. I use a resistance band as I can take it with me when I am travelling.Stress must have been a real thing when you were an active sportsman…We must understand there is good stress and bad stress. That\u2019s a great thing working with longevity experts like Dr Marcus Ranney (author of the book, \u2018Good Stress Bad Stress \u2014 Powerful Tools to Help You Thrive Under Pressure\u2019) It\u2019s always been the two sides of adrenaline for me \u2014 it can induce fear, but if you embrace it, it can make you sharper. I used stress to prepare better. The night before (a big game), meditation played a big part. \"Jonty There is concern in India about very young men, apparently fit, dying suddenly \u2014 on cricket fields, on badminton courts, at weddings. Are you aware of these incidents and what is your reading?A big issue for me in India is the Bollywood fitness template \u2014 big biceps and six-pack. You need to understand what\u2019s going on in your system. And that\u2019s where the important question comes in \u2014 how are we living our lives? You need to lead a healthy life to be fit.<\/p>\n

Longevity is not about living to be 100. If I die at 80, but I\u2019m running around chasing my kids, that\u2019s longevity \u2014 making sure my years on this planet are healthy onesJonty Rhodes<\/p>\n

Did you take supplements when you were a sportsman? Do you support protein supplements?I didn\u2019t take any supplements as a sportsman but during my playing days, we had only three options for drinks on the field \u2014 water, Coca-Cola and Coke with water. That was it. This was way before energy drinks and sports drinks came in. In a perfect world, you should be able get everything from your diet, but we know you\u2019re never going to. So, we take magnesium for sleep. I have taken supplements and I\u2019m not against them. Creatine is something I haven\u2019t yet taken, but I\u2019m investigating it.Is over-exercising a problem?I don\u2019t think so, but understanding your body is important. At my age, if I bust myself in the gym, I will feel it very, very quickly. I can put in maximum effort, but it\u2019ll take me two, three days to recover. Recovery is a big part of my focus now as opposed to just doing the training.<\/p>\n

My fitness is functional. At my age, a lot of it is about mobility. Three things that we focus on as a family to keep fit \u2014 sleep, nutrition and movementJonty Rhodes<\/p>\n

How much is fitness about engaging with life, being happy and being functional vs working towards longevity?Longevity is not about living to be 100. If I die at 80, but I\u2019m running around chasing my kids, then that is longevity for me. It\u2019s about making sure that the years on this planet are good, healthy ones. Because I have a blended family \u2014 I\u2019ve got kids and soon will have grandkids too (from my first marriage) \u2014 I\u2019m not biohacking to be 150. I\u2019m just ensuring, through lifestyle, that as long as I\u2019m on this planet, it\u2019s a healthy journey.One image of you that will always stick is of you riding an Enfield in sweltry Mumbai\u2026.As international sportsmen, you\u2019re told \u2014 seize the day, carpe diem. And that\u2019s always my story. In India, often the case is that when you\u2019re trying to seize the day, there\u2019s a door that\u2019s closed and you\u2019re trying to bash it down. But there is also a door that could open another path. But because you haven\u2019t given yourself the opportunity to embrace other scenarios, you miss the path that you should be on. So, this is more about me embracing life around me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At 56, ex-cricketer Jonty Rhodes, who now calls Goa home, champions a holistic approach to fitness, emphasizing the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":664409,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[38],"tags":[18308,256561,1198,281114,210,281113,281112,2241,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-664408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fitness","tag-bollywood","tag-cape-town","tag-fitness","tag-good-stress-bad-stress-powerful-tools","tag-health","tag-jonty-rhodes","tag-marcus-ranney","tag-south-africa","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116250217492060649","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}