For Ann Lighty, Exercising and Socializing are the Same

Workout partners, Ann Lighty, right, and Shonda Wingate, take on the elliptical machines at the Hartsville YMCA.


A little free weight training is part of Ann's regular workout session.





Treadmill and television -- often part of Ann Lighty's YMCA workout.



Ann Lighty warming up just prior to the YMCA Monday evening spin class.


Ann Lighty is one the Spin bike about 15 minutes prior to the music coming over the speakers. She is pedaling fast and this is just warm ups. As the class begins, and the music begins to pound she pedals faster and before long she is among the fastest spinners in the class -- and she maintains that pace through the hour-long class -- nearly every Monday and Wednesday evening. Spin is the work in her four-night-a-week exercise schedule. And, she has been finding Spin Class fun for about the past two years, since joining the YMCA just before she retired in August 2010.

Ann just barely made the criteria for this series about people working out past the age of 60. She hit that milestone on November 14, 2011. And, she is happy with her new age, smiling as she reflects on hitting 60 and noting that she believes she is getting older and getting better. "I'm proud I'm 60. Growing older and getting better...I am loving life." That may not have been so true a little more than three years ago. It was then that her husband succumbed to cancer and she was without her partner of 38 years. His death sent her into a depression that she fought and exercise became one of the weapons in her fight.

It was about two years ago that she decided she needed to do more than go to work and she joined the Y. At nearly that same time she talked a work colleague, Shonda Wingate, into joining her in the exercise. They have been workout partners for the past two years and it doesn't take long to notice they enjoy their time at the Y. "I'm not going to lie," says Shonda, "it might be as much for the socializing as it is for the physical but we enjoy it." Ann does say that having a workout partner is one of the motivations she sometimes needs to get up and get out to the gym. "I don't really like working out but I just work out," she says. "If I did not have someone to work out with, I might not come at all." They motivate each other and talk about how most days they can't wait to find out what the other has been up to.

"After my husband died, I lost some weight and then, I did not want to put it back on so that was my first reason for deciding to work out," says Ann. She knows the workouts give her more energy and she also says that one of the greatest benefits is "peace of mind." "You can come to the gym and just let your mind go," she notes.

Ann seems to be happy with her retirement, which came after about 19 years with the Scott Center, most recently int he Bridging the Gap program. She gets to keep up with things at work as she talks with Shonda. Besides working out, she likes yard work and has a dog that she walks, though it is not always clear if she is walking the dog or he is walking her. She has grown children and also has two grandchildren, students at Florence-Darlington Tech., living with her. She is certain that with her workouts she is in better shape than her teenage grands.

In addition to the Spin class, Ann mixes up her workouts with some light weights for arms and upper body and then work on the treadmill and sometimes the elliptical. She has found that she often enjoys watching the news on the PreCor Treadmill and says that makes the 30 minutes of walking go by pretty quickly.

As the interview was happening, a ten-year-old got on the adjacent treadmill telling us both that he thinks, "you are never too young to train." Ann smiled as she agreed with him and we turned that line around and decided that you are also probably never too old to begin to exercise.