Triathlete Won't Let Fat Get in the Way of Fit

PHOENIX — Here are some numbers on Dave Alexander, triathlete.

* Finished 276 triathlons in 37 countries in 17 years.

* Swam 9.6 miles, cycled 448 miles, ran 104.8 miles in a recent super-triathlon in eastern Hungary. His time, he says with perfect recall, was 85 hours, 46 minutes, 38 seconds.

Those are pretty remarkable numbers. But Alexander has a few more: He's 55 years old, 5 feet, 8 inches tall and 260 pounds.

"I am fat," he says. "I was born a big boy, and I'm always going to be big. But I'm healthy."

Alexander's silver hair is thinning. His bright blue eyes are going bad. His barrel stomach is getting bigger. Other triathletes often mistake him for a race organizer.

"I'm a great bar bet," he says with a laugh. "I don't look like I can walk across the street, let alone run a triathlon."

Alexander attributes his great shape--corroborated by his doctor and others--to plain doggedness. He sometimes completes two triathlons in a week. He sleeps about 4 1/2 hours a night so he can put in long hours of training and work at the oil company he co-owns.

Experts say he's just what the world needs: Someone who doesn't let weight get in the way of physical fitness.

A surprising number of people are both fit and obese, says Steven Blair, a scientist at the Cooper Institute of Aerobics Research in Dallas and senior editor of the 1996 Surgeon General's Report on Physical Activity and Health.

Blair recently conducted a study of obese men at the institute and found that 45% had no more than one of the major risk factors for an early death--smoking, poor eating habits, sedentary lifestyle, history of heart disease. These men, despite their obesity, had no increased mortality rate.

"Most people see an obese person walking down the street and they think, 'This guy's a time bomb.' It's not necessarily so," Blair says.

Dave Alexander is an extreme illustration. Although technically extremely obese, his body performs at the highest levels. Obesity is usually measured by the Body Mass Index, which is calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in meters squared. A person--man or woman--with a BMI of 25 or higher is considered overweight; obesity occurs at BMI 30 and higher.

Alexander's BMI is 40.

"Here's a guy that when you see his build and body, you say, 'How can he do this?' " says Andy Dzurinko, director of Arizona's Council on Health and Physical Fitness. "But he not only does it, he does it consistently. Inside that body mass, he's incredibly fit."