Speaking of exercise......

[Guest guest]

Marathon Men

Research continues to demonstrate the benefits of exercise, no matter your age. But the Tatum brothers, who for nearly 90 years have swum, skied, bowled, played football and worked in the yard, have never needed convincing.

By Lonnae O'neal

Sunday, August 17, 2008; Page W10

THE OLD MAN STOPS MOVING AND REACHES OUT TO GRAB THE EDGE OF THE POOL. He throws back his head to suck down a breath. His body sinks into the aquamarine water, but his eyes, which have their own blue depths, are alert as he watches the others swim laps around him. " I don't have much stamina, " Tatum says, panting. " These [laps] take a lot out of me. " In the next lane, Lauretta swims up to him. " I was telling my husband there's an 88-year-old guy I might try to get into the 200. " Tatum is actually 89.

" Push yourself, " , 69, says.

" I've done 200 already, " Tatum says.

" Without stopping? " asks.

says nothing.

" Let's go, you and I, " urges.

takes a deep breath, then nods. The two push off from the wall and start swimming, side-by-side, down the 25-yard lane. Down they swim, and back. pulls out front, her fluid strokes slicing through the water. follows, but after two laps, his stroke grows choppy. His arms get heavy. He fights with the water.

touches the wall at 100 yards and keeps swimming. touches the wall at 100 yards and stops. He just doesn't have it today. His teammate swims the last leg of her 200 then joins him. " You have to pace yourself, " she says. " Kick hard off the wall, coast in the middle, let your legs float so there's less drag in the water. "

" It's easier for you; you're a girl, " says, practicing his kicks.

" Let's do another 200, " says .

" Let's do 100, " counters.

No, let's put our minds on doing 200, and, if you have to do it really easy, turn over on your back. "

stares past her for a moment. Considers his next move. There and back, there and back, there and back, there and back. A long way to glory.

Tatum can see beyond the lane into the hopeful distance. He wants to finish in the top three at the Summer National Senior Games in August 2009 in San Francisco. In 2005, he won silver medals in the 50- and 100-yard freestyle events, but just a bronze in the 100-yard freestyle in 2007. That was the year his younger brother, Brad, 87, medaled in five events and broke Senior Olympics records in his age group in two. Brad's still swimming strong. But is the oldest one on the team and has started to feel himself slow. He can still drive to North Carolina to visit a friend, still hosts the annual neighborhood Father's Day celebration for hundreds. His life is rich and full of movement. He just worries, more often these days, how much longer it can stay that way.

" Okay, let's go, " tells . Side-by-side, the teammates push off. The following month, May, would be the Golden Olympics in D.C., a qualifying competition for the 2009 Senior Games. There probably won't be much competition in the 84- to 89-year-old category. Just Brad.

With every stroke, 's arms land heavy in the water.

Just keep swimming, he says to himself.

BRADFORD TATUM IS FINISHING HIS 500-YARD SWIM. He lifts the goggles from his eyes.

" He's not even breathing hard, " says Tatum. " I just finished a 100, and I'm like, huh, huh, huh, " he pants.

climbs on the diving block, leans into position, and sails into the lane, over the top of his brother's head. It's a typical Monday morning practice, and the Takoma Community Center pool in Northwest is churning. At the other end, an aerobics class is counting off. The sounds of voices and blaring music echo off the water, and the old men are cocooned by movement and sound. But then, that's something they've known all their lives.

There were eight Tatum kids, four boys and four girls, and they stayed in motion -- church, school, sports, piano lessons. Two sisters, Bradley, 79, who lives in Northeast Washington, and Honesty, 92, who still drives from her Northeast home to her Southeast church every Sunday, are still alive.

Brad, who fought in Europe during World War II and retired after more than 30 years as a teacher and administrator with the District public schools, is taller than his brother. , who retired as a computer programmer in 1974, after being with the Navy Department for nearly 35 years, has a bigger belly; but both of them have long and leanly muscled legs. They have no excesses of skin, no looseness around their limbs to provide resistance in the water or mark them as having spent almost nine decades in the world. Both brothers' blue eyes are still clear enough to take in everything.

The brothers share the lane, working on their freestyle. They first started swimming together as boys in a bygone Washington. They lived between Foggy Bottom and town when that part of the city was all black. The Ku Klux Klan once paraded past their house on horseback as clutched his mother's hand.

still remembers the playgrounds of his childhood, when the city felt more intimate. " We played dodge ball and had little track teams, " he says. " We used to skate, the kind you fastened onto your shoes -- Union Hardware skates -- and everybody mostly had a pair. Once we'd find streets that were not cobblestone, like Pennsylvania Avenue, we'd stay on them. "

Even as a young boy, he was thrilled to compete. In school, " if you got the highest mark on the test, that would be something, " he says. " It would be nice to be the smartest thing in the room. And on the field, it would be nice to be the home-run king or base-stealing king. I would not always be the best in everything, but I would always be trying. "

Every summer, they walked barefoot to the segregated swimming pool at Francis Recreation Center, where they'd spend the better part of hot Washington days.

Brad was the more celebrated swimmer, but once, when was in high school, he went to the center, where Brad was practicing with the junior high team. The brothers raced 50 yards, with Brad's teammates whooping and hollering the whole time. When won, they teased Brad and ran to tell the coach. didn't say a word. He hadn't realized he could outswim his brother. The two had never had any sort of rivalry.

Brad tagged along as his big brother delivered papers early in the morning. There were only three D.C. high schools for blacks in those days. went to the trade school at Armstrong. Brad went to the business school, Cardozo.

They shared clothes until Brad suddenly shot up taller than . They shared a bed until left for Virginia State University, where he studied industrial education, in 1936. continually played organized sports (baseball, softball and football, mostly) throughout his young adulthood. He began swimming again in the mid-1970s, after retiring. The brothers started swimming together with the Water Wizards, the official D.C. 50-and-over swim club, in the mid-1990s, when they were in their 70s. was the one who started competing locally, usually winning his competitions easily.

" Shucks, I'd always be first, " says. " Somehow [brad] couldn't catch me. " went to his first National Senior Games in 2003, where he won fourth place in the 50-yard freestyle and sixth in the 100. Then he won two silvers in 2005. Brad first competed in 2005, but missed two events because he was in the stands and didn't hear the announcer. He failed to place in three others. " Really, starting with 2007, that's the first time [brad] was winning the medals and not me. I won one [third place in the 100-yard freestyle], and he won five. "

That year, Brad broke the national senior record for the 50-yard freestyle in the 84 to 89 category by five seconds, with a time of 38.74. And with a time of 1:30.88, he broke the 100-yard freestyle record by three. In February, the city Department of Parks and Recreation honored Brad at its annual Black History Month swim meet. There was a proclamation from the mayor, and the flyer for the D.C. Golden Olympics Games featured a large picture of a smiling Brad on the front.

In the last few years, has gone from being a consistent winner to an also-ran. It's not that he's not tremendously proud of his brother, because he is. But more and more now, the doubts have started to creep in on him.

When does your body slow down for good?

At the pool, pulls himself from Lane 5. It is a labor-intensive process. He heaves once -- or twice, if he can't get enough lift -- to rest his belly on the edge of the pool, with his arms locked straight at his sides. He lingers like that for a few seconds, gathering his strength for the second big heave that sits him on the deck. He had hip replacement surgery in 1999 and takes a pill for hypertension, but other than that, he has no serious ailments.

Brad, who takes no medication and has never been seriously ill, is practicing his starts off a block at the front of the lane. He predicts he'll do well at the D.C. games next month. The 84 to 89 age group is light on competitor

will be 90 at the National Senior Games and is looking forward to a field without competition from his brother.

TO THOSE WHO STUDY AGING POPULATIONS, the Tatum brothers' remarkable strength and agility, or the idea of a 90-year-old competitive athlete, especially someone who has been active his entire life, syncs perfectly with a wide body of research.

With some exceptions (including prepubescent gymnasts), the human body is at its maximum potential in the 20s. " The amount of oxygen the lungs can provide the body is at its peak, " says Gayle Appel Doll, a gerontology professor and director of Kansas State University's Center on Aging. " The heart's ability to pump blood to the body is at its highest level. Muscle mass is at its greatest, " resulting in the body's highest strength levels.

Aging, which researchers define as the gradual loss of the body's ability to respond to the environment, results in a decline in all body systems. Muscle mass decreases, which means the body can't burn as many calories, which results in weight gain. This increases the likelihood of circulo-respiratory diseases.

But in 1990, the Journal of the American Medical Association published a groundbreaking study by researcher Fiatarone Singh, detailing her work with nursing home residents in Boston. The study featured 10 men, average age 90, suffering from the kind of muscle weakness that results in decreased mobility, falls and fractures. The men were placed on an eight-week strength regimen, working on leg machines no more than three times a week for 15 minutes. By the end of the study, their average leg strength had improved by more than 174 percent. Two men who had walked with canes were able to walk without them, and their overall walking speed and balance improved by an average of 48 percent.

" What we normally see is people who age prematurely from disease, poor nutrition and inactivity. But even if you wait until you are 90, it's important to build muscle strength, " Singh told the Boston Globe in an article about the study. " The muscles of older people are just as responsive to weight lifting as younger people's. "

The study so impressed Doll that she decided to perform her own experiment in 1993. " So you're stronger, what does that mean? " she wondered. She and a small group of assistants asked 25 adults, ranging in ages from 65 to 83, what activities were most important for maintaining their independence. She tested them in several areas: their ability to walk, carry groceries, get up and down on the floor, get in and out of the bathtub, climb stairs and lift cans over their heads to put in a cupboard. She rated them on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the lowest. The average score was 3 or 4, with activities requiring the most strength, such as getting up from the floor or out of the bathtub, being the most difficult.

She put the seniors in two groups; one doing weight training and one doing light calisthenics while sitting in a chair. After eight weeks, Doll says, both groups made significant, nearly equal improvements. Their scores got higher, and " five [seniors] improved enough that you were amazed. " Not only were two women who had been unable to get out of the bathtub able to get out, " one fairly hopped out, " Doll says. " We wanted to show that similar functional improvements could occur without the need for a heavy weight regime. " Older people could improve their strength, " which means they didn't have to lose it in the first place, " says Doll. They gained confidence, which helped them keep moving.

Doll's findings are also supported by a long-term study of 2,400 British twins, published in January in the Archives of Internal Medicine. The study examined telomeres, cell structures that carry genes and cap the ends of chromosomes. When cells divide, telomeres get shorter, until eventually they can't divide any further. Telomere length is a marker of aging, and researchers found that the more physically active twin had longer telomeres, resulting in cells that appeared up to six years younger than the more sedentary twin. The cells of a twin who exercised vigorously could appear nearly a decade younger.

" These data suggest that the act of exercising may actually protect the body against the aging process, " Tim Spector, a London professor of genetic epidemiology who led the study, told Washington Post reporter Rob Stein in an article.

Research also shows that men and women age differently. " Men who survive beyond the age of 85 are more likely than women to be in better health and to have more remaining years of independent life, " according to a 1994 study in the Journal of Aging and Human Development. No one really knows why, Doll says, but men seem to be more susceptible to acute disease and illness, and women to chronic problems. " I think the culprit here is arthritis -- women are more likely to suffer from it, and it is the condition most likely to lead to disability. "

With decades of scientific evidence, it would seem an easy thing to convince older Americans to exercise, but according to Doll, the social stereotype of aging is one of the hardest barriers to overcome.

Commercials, movies and television shows often feature the elderly as incontinent, grumpy, content to sit in armchairs clutching remotes, tuned into television for hours; mentally slack with all the meaning in their lives already behind them. " If we have images of what we should be at 89, then we start to act and function like what society tells us we should be doing, " Doll says.

She says she fights that image in her work and her life. She has worked out every day for the past 25 years. " I make myself do a cartwheel and split at least once a year. I warm up a lot more; but I'm 54 and can still do it. "

It's a way to be more deliberate about aging well that's often missing from the aging process, she says. " Think about all the older people who one day make that last trip down to the floor with their grandchildren and never sit on the floor again, or climb the stairs and then decide they can never climb the stairs again. "

This isn't to say that people suffering from degenerative conditions can simply will themselves better with exercise, she points out. But with appropriate exercise, most people can show some improvement.

le Redford writes a fitness column for AARP magazine and has followed the Senior Olympics movement. She points out that exercise doesn't have to be vigorous and that improvements can be made with light strength training. " That's not to say that at 89, you'll be the same athlete you were at 30, 40 or 50, " Redford says. But you can reverse some of the decline. There is an enhanced quality of life, that comes with being active and engaged, and, she says, " you're never too old to begin that process. "

IT'S EARLY SPRING and Coach Rodger McCoy paces the tiles poolside at the Takoma Community Center as he watches his Water Wizards do drills. He limps slightly from arthritis in his hips. He's not in the water with his team, so he has to be precise about what he expects from them. A 100-yard swim done at around 2 minutes, 40 seconds; a 200-yard swim at 3 minutes, 10 seconds; 300 yards at 7 _ minutes. Two hundred yards fast, another hundred yards easy.

McCoy, 68, has coached the Takoma chapter of the Water Wizards, a team of 48 swimmers ranging in ages from 50 to 89, since it began in the mid-1990s. He's coached swimming in Washington nearly 30 years. He wants his entire team to compete next month in the D.C. Golden Olympics and expects them all to at least post qualifying times for the National Senior Games. One of the 70-year-olds on the team had hip replacement surgery two months earlier. McCoy wants him to compete in the 200-yard freestyle. That sounds prohibitively difficult for a still-recovering man his age, but McCoy disagrees.

" It's a mind-set, " he says. " But a matter of your focus as well. A matter of what you want to do with your time. " The drills are written on a white board on the side of the pool. McCoy leaves them on the board after practice is over. Another coach has the 19-years-and-older team at Takoma. He'll often uses the same workout.

" I try to make sure they are swimming all the strokes, so that their muscle groups are balanced out, " McCoy says.

Standing on the deck, a 56-year-old man complains about his endurance. McCoy corrects him. " You lack the confidence. You have more endurance than you think. "

A lot of his swimmers want to stay on the wall and rest. " I make them do easier swims more continuously, " McCoy says. " That builds endurance. " He has the seniors swim twice their competition distance without stopping, to build up their wind. People lose confidence when they tell themselves they can't, they shouldn't, they are much too old, he says. " By keeping the pressure on yourself, you start to realize you can do more. After all, you're still alive; your body is still functioning. "

Tatum is swimming his 50-yard freestyle at around 48 seconds. McCoy thinks has more left in him, if he wants it badly enough. If he gets his head down to break the water better. Trains harder. Doesn't let his own creeping doubts cloud his vision.

At a late April practice, Tatum has finished his warm-up.

" Are you leaving now? " McCoy yells out.

" Not yet, " yells back.

" I want you to do a 25 for time. I want you to push it, all out. Start fast and get faster. If you don't start fast enough, you have to do another one. "

" Okay, " says . Then grumbles. " He wants me to dive. I'm tired, but he doesn't want me to push off. "

gets a cramp in his foot, and decides against diving in.

" I'm timing you from the moment your feet hit the wall until the moment your hand hits the wall on the other end, " says McCoy.

" Yes, sir, " says .

" Don't forget: Start fast! " McCoy yells.

pushes off. He swims flat out. He chops through the water the length of the lane.

McCoy stops his watch. Twenty-six seconds. Not good. Olympic athletes can swim 25 yards in about 10 seconds. A good time for would be around 23 or 24 seconds.

did a couple things that slowed him down, McCoy says. " He breathed right there, " he says, pointing to a spot early in the lane. " That's two seconds after he left the wall. "

pushes off again. This time, he waits a few seconds before taking his first breath. He shaves a second off his time. McCoy still isn't satisfied. " That's faster, " McCoy says. " But if you do those first few strokes before you take a breath, you'll be past the flag. And think how much faster you'll be on the dive. "

It can seem disconcerting to have a coach admonish an 89-year-old man for breathing. But not if that swimmer wants to get better, says McCoy. Besides, he says, he's not pushing that hard. " He has done the whole length with no breath before. "

WHEN HE WAS DRAFTED INTO THE NAVY, Tatum helped others learn survival skills. " They had me demonstrating how to swim when shipwrecked, with oil on the water, and fire. How to get a breath by beating the water back. "

Then his commanding officers wanted to know if anybody could swim 50 yards underwater without coming up, says. " I said I could do it. It was a 25-yard pool. I was able to go down one end of the pool underwater and come back the other end. Still underwater. "

When he finally came up for air, the recruits were yelling out his name. " It was like I was a celebrity, " says.

It was the mid-1940s, and was serving with an all-black regiment stationed in Bainbridge, Md. There were postings in their bulletins asking for recruits to become Navy frogmen. These were the guys who did underwater operations during combat: surveillance, intelligence, planting explosives. Something he wanted to do. Something he thought he'd be good at.

went to his commanding officer to ask for an application. His CO said no. Blacks in his regiment were steward's mates. Their job was to serve officers in their quarters. Steward's mates could not be frogmen.

Eventually, became a civilian systems analyst with the Navy, programming the big mainframes in the early days of computers. In 1944, married the sister of one of his best childhood friends, and he and his wife, Pearl, had six children. She was a homemaker, and for 25 years he worked second jobs: He was a night switchboard operator, he bartended, he cleaned offices downtown. And he fed his lifelong urge for competition with sports.

Nearly every year, he played on the Navy Yard softball team. If there was a basketball game at the rec center, he'd join in, and he played sandlot football. These were neighborhood teams -- he played with the town Athletic Club, but there were the U Street Lions, and the Willowtrees out of Southwest -- who would compete in informal pickup games. When they got old enough, his three sons joined him.

" All during my adults years, I played something, somewhere, " says . " It was the thirst for competition really. " It wasn't " like it is now, where people do things for fitness. I didn't know the help it would do to my body, and all like that. I just played ball. "

He played with the Navy Yard softball team until he retired. " I was 55 on a Thursday, and Friday I was out of there. After that I was like, How did I have time to work eight hours a day? " He'd always been good with his hands. He did fix-it jobs around his Michigan Park home in Northeast D.C. He knocked out a wall and put up drywall. He put a new roof on his sister's house in Millpoint, Md. He bought a motor home, and he and Pearl traveled all around the country.

When he was 70, he took up skiing. Brad had started skiing a few years before, and together he and traveled with the Black Ski Club. At 80, quit; he had knee replacement surgery and decided the slopes might be a little too hard on him. At 80, Brad quit, too. He had broken his arm and fractured his knee, and decided he wanted to stop while all his parts still worked.

In 1978, Pearl died of pancreatic cancer. had made plant shelves before she got sick, and as she was dying, she liked to lie in the bed and look at her flowers. He was her sole caregiver but says, " I never had any kind of breakdown. When you did everything you could while they're living, you don't have much to cry about. "

In the mid-1980s, his son Rodney went to a wake and decided it was wrong that the only time the family got together was when someone died. The Tatums began a tradition: a softball game at the old Taft Field, then back to the house for a big cookout every Father's Day. People came by for sports and for fellowship, and his son's friends, who had become surrogate sons to , came to celebrate as well.

In 1990, he was taking his 42-year-old daughter, Marilynn, who had battled cancer for several years, to hospice. He was sitting with her in the ambulance, looking into her eyes when she died. Six months later, Rodney, only 37, fainted and went into the hospital, complaining of shortness of breath. A few weeks later, he had surgery to remove part of a cancerous lung and doctors put him into an induced coma. He died of pulmonary failure a few days after that.

But the annual Father's Day tradition begun by Rodney continues. 's son , a sports reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, drives down to help organize it; his daughter Joyce, who retired as a public health analyst for the Department of Health and Human Services and lives with , helps, too. It has grown to include hundreds of men and their families -- some professional and some just regular guys from around the way. played softball with them until he was 75. One year they voted him MVP, but he thinks they were just putting him on.

They all stopped playing nearly 10 years ago. The surrogate sons said they were getting too old.

Twice a month, attends fellowship meetings for the seniors at Liberty Baptist Church, where he and 22 others were baptized in 1929. Only four of them are still alive. He's the only man. Every few months, he cooks for big church functions. He gardens every spring, cuts his own grass, and still does projects around the house. He had a good voice and used to sing in a quartet. But the other three members died

Four years ago, he was on a ladder putting in insulation at his sister's house. He leaned over to do some stapling and fell off, hitting his head. The pain in his neck lingered six months. He was afraid it would never go away. For a long time, it was hard for him to accept that he might be too old to climb a ladder to do roof repairs, or put up siding, or do any of those jobs he had taken so much pride in doing himself. Two years ago, it got too hard to pull out the starter cord, and he had to give up his push lawn mower. A couple of his surrogate sons bought him a riding mower.

Again, the doubts crept up on him.

When does your body slow down for good?

There's a display case at the top of the stairs of his Northeast home. Inside are dozens of swimming medals and ribbons. There's a rifle from a gun collection he had when he thought he might want to take up hunting. On the wall, there is a mock USA Today sports section front with a picture of in his 70s. He's waterskiing in Lake in central Virginia. At least once a week, one of his surrogate sons or somebody from the neighborhood comes around to talk or check in on him. " Man, I want to be just like you when I grow up, " they always tell him.

Tatum badly wants to hold on to that. " My turn is going to come, " he says. " But that's the thing: You just don't want to be sick and have to depend on somebody to take care of you. " That would be bad, he says. That would be worse than dying.

IT'S THE THIRD FRAME AT THE STRIKE HOUSE BOWLING CENTER IN HYATTSVILLE, and Brad Tatum gives the 14-pound ball a small toss to send it slowly down the lane. Pins are breaking all around him. As he watches the lane, he does a little hitch with his leg to maybe give the ball more momentum. It works, sort of. He knocks down eight.

He's been bowling about seven years. He started with a senior men's team, " but they are dropping off, " he says. One of his teammates died of a heart attack, and another one died of cancer. " We were getting so few, we had to merge with the ladies, " he says. Two years ago, his men's league merged with the Strikes and Misses women's league; he joined the Sunshine team, becoming the only male bowler among three women.

Brad's not a great bowler -- on this day, his best game is a 162 -- but he likes coming out and seeing people.

Brad points to a woman standing nearby. " She was a little girl, in 5th or 6th grade, at one of the first places I taught, " Brad says. That's often how it's been since he's gotten older. He and have typically had to go down a generation to find people to do things with.

Swimming was something he could do solo. When he won his five medals in the 2007 games, " He brought them home and hung them over the hearth, " says his wife, Louise, 84. The Tatums, who have three children, are sitting in the living room of their Northeast home, less than 15 minutes from where lives, and from the Takoma Park pool.

" My brother and I played football, basketball, tennis and whatnot, " Brad says. " Because you've been athletic all your life, you never stop. " He knows lots of people who are equally long-lived, " But they're heavier, and creaky. You know, their bones crack. They're slow and they may be sharp of mind, but they're just not physically active. "

He's taught his grandsons to swim. Every Sunday, he sings in the choir at St. 's Episcopal Church in Foggy Bottom, which he joined after getting married. Church members call him whenever they need something done. He likes being a man everyone can depend on. In addition to the swimming and bowling, he still golfs some. And plays poker once a week. The guys he plays with are all just 75 or 80.

Part of his church responsibilities include visiting the sick and shut-in. Often, they are also younger. Louise's brother is 85, but has a degenerative muscle condition and can't get around. She is not active herself; she has arthritis, two artificial hips and an artificial knee, but she's accustomed to all her husband's activity. People are living longer, their minds are active, they want to do more things, she says. " Just look at us. When we were growing up, if you were 80, wow, you were dead, or close to it. We were talking about you in the past tense. "

At the Golden Games, Brad is swimming the 50, 100, 200 and 500 freestyle. " Once I found out I could do the 200 good, I found out I could do the 500. " He's also going to compete in the 50- and 100-yard breaststroke. He pulls out the program from the 2007 Senior Olympics. There are asterisks by his name, in the events where he broke records.

" will be 90 years old at the next games. " Brad says. Some [of the competitors] have to be lifted into the water to swim because they have disabilities. We don't. We dive in, and we're going. "

JOHN TATUM USED TO WALK TO LIBERTY BAPTIST CHURCH when it was in Foggy Bottom, before Washington University bought the land. When it moved to Kentucky Avenue SE, he moved with it. He left the church when he went to college, attending his wife's church for a while, but came back for good 20 years ago. Walking through the empty sanctuary, with the light just breaking through the stained glass windows, he jiggles the lectern next to the organ. One of the deacons had found it about eight months ago, dark and scuffed up. sanded it down, stained it blond to match the piano, gave it more useful life.

It is the second Monday of the month, and the senior citizens' ministry is about to begin. When joined 10 years ago (at the behest of two of his sisters), there were more than 40 people, but they are down to about 17 now, including just one sister. " We've been trying to get some 60s or 50s to come, but they aren't ready yet, " says.

Another woman used to come regularly, but she can't drive anymore and doesn't have any way of getting there. " I've seen her two times in the last couple of years, " says . " That will probably happen to all of us. "

He is sitting at a table in the basement as the other seniors trickle in. One of the assistant ministers plays a hymn on the piano as takes stock of what it means to grow old.

" It hurts, " he says softly. " Like it not being a safe thing for me to get up on that ladder anymore, or like when your strength leaves your body, like my buddy. " Over time he watched a friend lose the ability to open a jar, or even pull himself up from a chair. " I don't know what's wrong with me, " the friend would despair.

It is said, God saves his hardest blows for the later rounds.

" Sometimes he'd start to cry, " says . He grows quiet for a moment.

" I just say, 'But for the grace of God, there go I.' This is what I think when I see people like that. That I'm lucky to be like I am and not like they are. But I guess the time will come. I just hope mine is quick. " He sighs. He's been procrastinating but soon, he thinks, he's got to get around to writing out his will.

used to have a lady friend, but she moved to North Carolina earlier this year. She visited Washington in June, and drove her home, then drove back to Washington by himself. He had another lady friend for nearly 20 years, but she died of cancer in 2002. Now he says, he doesn't really have any companion. " Nobody to invite over to dinner, you know. "

Last August, his brother-in-law and oldest friend, " Toots, " died. He and had known each other since they were 10. " This was the guy I used to compete against more than anybody else, " says . " He was on one Navy Yard [softball] team and I was on the other. My 70-year-long buddy. "

" He did me dirty, dyin' on me like that, " says . " He left me. "

remembers the bicentennial celebration of Washington's birthday in 1932; Lindbergh crossing the Atlantic; playing on the newly built Lincoln Memorial; that time he fell on the ball and helped win the game for his sandlot team. All those " interchanging memories " are gone, he says, because he doesn't have the friends to remember them with. No amen chorus to his oldest songs.

" Most of those who passed on were not active, " says . " They stayed behind the steering wheel, even to go to the store. There were times I didn't have a car and had to walk everywhere. "

It's meeting time in the church basement, and by 11, and eight other seniors are singing Psalm 46. His voice is strong and off-key. " Holy, holy, holy. "

They go through the old business. " I took Ms. phine shopping Thursday, " one woman says. " She's suffering with arthritis, but she did good. She walked. She took her time. "

The seniors nod. Amen.

THE TATUM BROTHERS are standing in the doorway of 88-year-old Mabel B. 's home, waiting for her to answer the bell. Brad's come to invite her to St. 's Episcopal Church's 141st anniversary celebration in a few weeks. used to work with her late husband, so he tags along.

Ms. , wearing jeans and flowered house slippers, comes slowly to the door and invites them in.

They sit in the front room, where her old paintings hang on the wall. She hasn't taken a brush to canvas in many, many years. A clock ticks faintly on the mantle. Clear plastic covers the sofa a few feet away. Uncirculated air and the stillness of old things, or perhaps it is the very oldness of still things, are heavy in the room.

They talk about her husband Henry, who was 99 when he died last year. " Every Sunday at 8 o'clock, he was right " in church, Brad says. He tells her about the anniversary program. She doesn't usually leave the house. " I have a problem with my balance, " Ms. says, " I don't walk too well, so the doctor doesn't want me to go out by myself. "

" Well, we're gonna get somebody to come by here if you want to go, " Brad says. He'd come pick her up himself, but he's got practice. " The choir director wants us there right on time. "

They talk some more about her late husband. She promises Brad she'll let him know if she can make it to the church anniversary celebration. They admire the paintings on the walls for a few moments. Then the brothers drive back to Brad's house.

Brad never thinks about being confined to the house himself. " That doesn't worry me. That's like 10 years from now or 15 years from now, " the 87-year-old record holder says. " When you're active, you don't think about these things. "

But his older brother thinks about it. A lot, sometimes. " I think about what do you do when you don't have the ability to drive anymore? " says. " I guess you don't go nowhere. "

But that's a ways off, he thinks. He still has so much he wants to accomplish.

AT THE OPENING CEREMONY for the 25th Annual D.C. Golden Olympics, the bleachers are full, and latecomers search for seats. Shortly after 11, the seniors parade into the Emery Recreation Center gymnasium, in Northwest D.C. The athletes -- archers, tennis players, sprinters and senior swimmers from all over the city -- are led by Brad, who holds his foil torch high. is just behind him, waving to the crowd. " The race is not just about the swiftest or the fastest, " the announcer says, " it's also about those who endure. "

After the ceremony, the Tatums each drive to the Takoma pool. " It's my time to shine, " says. It's the first day, and the sparsely filled bleachers feature Brad's wife, Louise, and the Tatums' sister .

has stripped down to his dark Under Armour trunks, with goggles strapped around his neck. His towel drapes his shoulders, and his flip-flops squish across the pool tiles. He is all set. The problem is, he doesn't have any events. It's Tuesday, and his events, the 50 and 100 freestyle, are two days away.

" Maybe I'll get in the pool if they need some swimmers to fill out the lane, " he says. Brad is about to swim his 500 freestyle. There are other Takoma Water Wizards -- including 59-year-old Karyn Baiorunos and 70-year-old Jim Sale, one of the strongest swimmers on the team -- in the event. is sitting on a bulkhead at the end of the lane so he can flip the placards in the water, to keep his brother's lap count. Brad has to swim 20 of them. There are six swimmers in the field. The swimmers take their mark. A dozen or so fans lean over the railings to watch. But the start gun misfires. " False start! " McCoy calls out, but Brad doesn't hear him. All his focus is his lane. People are yelling for him to stop but he finishes a lap and starts back before he realizes it was a false start.

When he gets back in place, the gun fires, and the race starts again. The swimmers are close for five laps, but Brad's goggles start to fall off his eyes by the sixth. After a while, he just takes them off. By lap 15, Brad has switched from freestyle to breaststroke. Sale touches the wall at 8:14.43. Baiorunos is behind him at 9:02.04. Brad, who is nearly 30 years older, comes in at 10:40.87.

" That false start probably did him in, " says .

Nevertheless, Brad was the only competitor in his age bracket. He was racing for time. Rodger McCoy walks up to him, smiling. " You were way under the national qualifying time! " McCoy says. " You might get a gold at nationals! " Louise and wave from the bleachers above the pool.

" I feel pretty good, pretty good, " Brad says.

At the next day's competition, is standing near the scorers table. McCoy has entered him in the 200 freestyle, and his teammates, including Lauretta , are trying to get him to agree.

" No, that's too much distance, " insists . " I'm going to do the 50. "

On deck is the 100-yard breaststroke. They all watch as Brad dives off the block. and Baiorunos are down the lane quickly. Brad is behind them by several seconds. An 81-year-old-woman trails them all. At the finish, Baiorunos has swum 1:52.33 and touches the wall at 1:55.02. Brad has swum 2:30.42, again in plenty of time to qualify for nationals (4:56.60).

The 200 freestyle is next. is still refusing. " I don't swim long distance. I have a -- what do you call it -- a zone. "

Finally, Wednesday, the big day of competition, arrives. stretches on deck along the side of the pool, spreading his arms wide. Brad is eager to get started.

It's the 100-yard freestyle.

" I'll give him this one, and I'll take the 50, " says , " but I'm going to try him, though. "

" We'll both be behind them, " Brad says, gesturing toward the younger seniors, " but we'll be together. "

They get to their platforms. The gun fires. and Brad dive into lanes 4 and 5. They touch the wall at the same time, but Brad turns quicker. At the 50-yard mark, Brad is one body length ahead. By the turn at 75 yards, he's widened the lead. Brad touches the wall half a pool ahead of his brother to win for their category.

" I pooped out on that last one, but I made it, " says . " I'll do better in the 50. "

The next event is the 50-yard breaststroke. is sitting on a fold-up chair behind the lifeguard stand. He hadn't planned on swimming in this race. He ponders it for a few seconds. Ah, what the heck? He goes to tell McCoy he's in. He takes the platform next to his brother. The Tatum boys, from Foggy Bottom, who grew up swimming together in the 1920s and '30s, dive into the pool. From up top, they look like submarines, their dark trunks extending their lines for long seconds under water. Then both come up and head into their stroke.

The sons are on the rail. The surrogate sons are on the rail. Brad's wife is cheering. So is the 92-year-old sister. The noise echoes off the pool and surrounds them.

They are even after the first turn. Then gains a few inches. His head is straight. He's not looking at the competition. He's got no drag in the water. He's just swimming for time.

Brad touches the wall at 1:07.05, a good enough score to qualify for nationals. But touches the wall at 1:02.52, time enough to qualify, and time enough to win, beating his brother for the first time in years.

He emerges smiling from the water to the wild cheers of his teammates, who surround him and clap him on the back. " Well, I'll be damned, " he says.

Lonnae O'Neal is a Washington Post staff writer.