Call Guinness! Brunswick County 71-year-old wants even more world records

Ginny MacColl keeps redefining her goals, her physique and the limitations of an aging athlete

OAK ISLAND, NC (WWAY) — Her grandkids call her “ZZ”, but you can just call her “athlete”.

71-year-old Ginny MacColl says that was a title she hadn’t considered for herself, until she started competing, and winning, as a ninja warrior.

To understand where she’s going now, you have to learn where she’s been.

“I had never been an athlete,” she told WWAY’s Donna Gregory.

“I had never been in a gym.  I had never done any sports. I was a dancer, but to say the word ‘athlete’ was difficult for me to do.”

“But that’s the one I’m most proud of,” she admitted.

MacColl wanted to take the arts world by storm as a modern dancer, when she moved to New York decades ago, at age 20.

“I gave myself three to five years to accomplish that,” she said.

“I did modern dance [in] companies, which is more interpretive dance, and I did scholarships and such and ended up actually on Broadway in a show called Pippin in 1975.”

Ginny stayed active and spent decades performing on and off stage and screen.

“I think I’ve always just wanted to be the best that I can be, and to keep going,” she said.

“And I wanted to be the best dancer and the best on stage, and the best in commercials — I did tv commercials as well — and the best in radio.  And all of those things have to do with persistence and rejection.”

She was born with tenacity and grit, and she helped model those traits for her daughter, who was a star high school and college gymnast and pole vaulter.

When her daughter started competing on American Ninja Warrior, MacColl took notice, and decided that the teacher should become the student.

“My daughter, Jessie Graff, was on American Ninja Warriors for 10 seasons”, she said.

“She’s one of the top ninjas, and she looked so graceful, so healthy, and so vigorous, and she had muscles.”

So, a few years ago, at age 63 and battling a bone disease called osteopenia, MacColl decided she wanted muscles, too.

“I got my little pull up bar and I put it in the closet, and I couldn’t get anywhere; I had no upper body strength,” she laughed.

That’s when the former dancer found a trainer, and she couldn’t use age as an excuse for lack of strength.

Chuck “The Chuckster” Mammay took her on as a client, and he’s almost ten years her senior.

He is arguably the fittest 80-year-old you will ever meet and has built his own ninja training facility in his front yard in Oak Island, NC.

Mammay has some fond memories of his early sessions with Ginny MacColl, and her upper body strength when he met her.

“Zero,” he laughed, “but she had great legs which I knew she could do the steps well.”

“And of course, Ginny, there’s no ‘quit’ in her,” he added.  “She kept working and working and getting better and getting better…and you see where she’s at now ’cause she doesn’t quit.”

And now, just watch her go!

At nearly 72-years-old, Ginny MacColl says she has gained more benefits than just sheer strength.

“It’s amazing, that after 2 years with a personal trainer, I went to do the bone density scan.  And I was eager to see if lifting weights would make a difference, and it did.”

“I reversed it to normal, which, I wanted to shout out to the world… ‘women, definitely, you need to start lifting weights’!”

MacColl says it’s all about baby steps, knowing your limits, then pushing your limitations, within reason.

“If you can do a little bit to help yourself get stronger and healthy, then it’s not gonna hurt you, right?” she asked.

“It’s only going to make you getter and healthy and strong.”

And MacColl is all about the strength, having competed herself as a ninja on national tv.

She continues to train and shows no sign of slowing down.

And the world is watching her hard work pay off, almost a decade after she started training.

She’s now featured in the 2024 Ginness Book of World Records, as the oldest female ninja warrior athlete.

“Being in the Guinness Book of World Records is like– the WORLD!  It’s amazing!” she grins.

MacColl swims to keep up her cardio strength and competes regularly in swimming events.

She also helps train other aspiring athletes, no matter their age.

“You’re never too old, and it’s never too late,” she advises.

“You can do so much more than you think you can, and you need to keep moving so your parts don’t rust.  And you can make the impossible: possible, if you have the mental fortitude.”

She’s a nimble ninja, aging with extraordinary strength and grace.

She’s remembering where she started, and realizing, she doesn’t have to stop.

“You know, maybe I could be in the Guinness Book of World records at 80– wouldn’t that be cool?” she laughed.

“I have some ideas of things I want to do now: I want to rope climb, I’d like to do, maybe, tons of pullups.”

“Maybe I could be the oldest person to do 30 pullups!”

She believes fitness, specifically weight training, is important for people of all genders, no matter where they are in their life.

“I think it’s important for all ages,” she explained.

“So that’s why my motto is, Strength is Ageless.”

And she’s proving it, with every world record she tries to set.