Connecticut woman, 100, who doesn’t take meds or diet stuns locals after completing 5k road race

Connecticut centenarian Marion ‘Mic’ Roberts, who neither diets nor takes medications, credits her love of walking for staying young and vital. 

The spry Ms Roberts completed her second 5k road race recently, stunning locals who were keen to learn her secret for staying spritely. 

Mic Roberts said: ‘I just live day to day… And if someone says, ‘Let’s do something,’ I say, ‘Sure.’’

At 100, Ms Roberts, wearing her pearls, completed the Haddam Neck Fair 5K in about 90 minutes alongside her son, Chuck Roberts, and daughter-in-law, Donna Roberts, while listening to some Frank Sinatra. 

She finished the same 3.1-mile race in 56 minutes last year. 

This year, Ms Roberts won her 80-plus age group and was awarded a medal by the organizers while fellow runners cheered. 

Ms Roberts does not take prescription medications, nor does she follow a diet. She is an avid walker and covers a lot of ground each day, between two and three miles. 

Ms Roberts said she doesn’t ‘like sitting around’ and instead walks laps around her senior center and on a nearby trail. She walks around two to three miles everyday. 

Don’t let her age fool you. Ms Roberts led her younger family members across the finish line. 

Donna Roberts, her daughter-in-law, said: ‘She’s leading the way here.’

‘She’s 40 years older than I am and she doesn’t slow down… She sets the pace, and we follow her.’ 

Ms Roberts said she wasn’t expecting the fanfare that greeted her at the finish line: ‘I thought it sounded like fun. I just thought I’d do it and come at the tail end and go home.’ 

Crossing the finish line was not an insurmountable task for her. Ms Roberts walks laps around a nearby trail and her senior living center totalling two to three miles each day. 

Ms Roberts said: ‘It doesn’t take very long. I just like to get out in the air and move, I don’t like sitting around.’

Her other hobbies include playing bocce and bridge at her senior living facility. 

Ms Roberts has led an active life. She taught dance lessons in her younger years and golfed until a shoulder injury at age 80 got in her way and forced her to stop. 

She has also endured her fair share of tragedy. Her husband, whom she met while teaching dance, died in 1999. Two of her three sons have also passed away. She broke her pelvis in 2020 and was later diagnosed with Covid. Nevertheless she persisted.

Donna Roberts said of her mother-in-law: ‘She takes one pill a day. She’s completely healthy. It’s her attitude. She’s overcome a lot of obstacles and kept going.’