Mitchells Plain honours local legend Thomas Lewis
MITCHELLS Plain pensioner Thomas Lewis has proven age is nothing but a number.
The 65-year-old has been offering physical exercise lessons for people on the Cape Flats.
The father of three yesterday described his work as a “gift of life”.
“Doing this is like a second job for me because I have always been into sport,” he said as he gave exercises to a group of 30 women.
“When you combine sport to aerobics, it is totally different because you do gravity work outside, whereas you do something completely different with this activity. I never thought I would end up enjoying doing this training, and each year I would often tell myself that this is the last year of being an instructor,” he said.
But he ended up wanting to do it again the following year, said Lewis.
Lewis runs the Lentegeur Health and Fitness Organisation in association with the city council, and trains 150 men and women at the Lentegeur Civic Centre.
His daughter Kaamilah Williams, has assisted him for 30 years and described it as a journey that has been successful for both.
Lewis’s inspiration to become an exercise instructorcame after he received a gym membership card from a close friend.
He later developed his passion for training people and this resulted in him becoming an instructor at a Cape Flats gym.
His physical exercises included aerobics and tae bo.
Lewis said the lack of equipment was one of the main challenges he faced. He appealed to people wanting to donate equipment to visit the civic centre.