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Video: Stephanie Leslie
works out

She's lost a third of her body weight and visits the gym four
times a week – and she’s 86.

The oldest gym bunny in St Mary’s Bay is Stephanie Leslie , a
retired nurse who has done everything from knife fighting with the
Zambian police to health checks on Channel Tunnel workers.

And Mrs Leslie, of Taylor Close, even midwifed at the birth of
her personal trainer.

She was put on a weight-loss course by her doctor four years
ago, when she joined the Marsh Academy leisure centre in New Romney
and began training on treadmills, bikes, cross-trainers, steppers,
rowers, shoulder and chest presses and an assisted chin-up
machine.

Since then the 5ft grandmother’s weight has dropped from 11st
9lb to only 7st 6lb, and she is a woman not to be crossed.

She entertains other gym-goers by teaching them how to stab and
shoot – skills she picked up while living in Africa for 17 years –
and telling them about her career.

She qualified as a nurse on the day the NHS was founded, July 5,
1948, and only retired in 2003.

Mrs Leslie, who moved to Romney Marsh in 1969, told the Kentish
Express: “I had raised blood pressure and cholesterol and I knew I
needed to do something.

“Some days I’ll wake up feeling groggy and going to the gym
completely invigorates me.”

But not everything is easy for Mrs Leslie, whose son Keith, 45,
dad to her nine-year-old granddaughter Ruth, is a former Harlequins
rugby player.

“At the moment I have a pulled hamstring,” she said. “I got too
enthusiastic on the machines and it wasn’t helped by a fall I had
in my garden when I was trying to feed a badger.”

Mrs Leslie’s trainer, Emma Parkes , said she wanted to encourage
other pensioners to join the gym.

“We break everything down into sections and she doesn’t do
anything she doesn’t want to do,” she said.

“I’ve been with her all four years and she’s been completely
transformed.”