Top 5 sportspersons still competitive at an old age

#4 Bernard Hopkins – Boxing

Bernard Hopkins reclaimed his light heavyweight crown at the age of 46

Hopkins grew up in a poor family and had taken to crime during his teenage years, which resulted in him being sent to prison when he was only 18. There, he coincidentally discovered boxing, a thing which entirely changed his fortunes.

After coming out of prison, he joined professional boxing in the late 1980s. He lost his initial bout, but after that, he recovered and went on to win numerous bouts in succession until he finally won the USBA Middleweight title in 1992.

He then lifted the IBF Middleweight title the following year and finally became world champion after winning the IBF Middleweight title in 1994.

After this, he continued to hold the world middleweight title from 1994 to 2005 and in the process also unified WBC, WBA, and The Ring titles in 2001 and topped it all after adding WBO title to his tally in 2004.

Then, after losing his middleweight titles in the mid 2000s, he started competing in Light Heavyweight division.

In 2006, he became world champion when he won WBC, IBO and The Ring Light Heavyweight titles, before losing it two years later. He then reclaimed the titles, thus breaking George Foreman’s record of being oldest world champion, by clinching the title at 46 years of age in 2011. If this wasn’t enough, he outdid his own record, when he retained the titles at 48 and then at 49 years of age.

He lost his titles to Sergey Kovalev in late 2014, but he still hasn’t retired. As of 2016, he is finalizing on what would be his final fight, but no confirmation about it has been released yet.