The BBC reported on Tuesday that the oldest person in the world, a 115 year old Dutch woman named Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper (“Hennie”), had just died. When she assumed the title last year, reporters asked the inevitable “to what do you attribute, etcetera” questions, and she gave a conventional answer: “I eat a herring every day and I drink a glass of orange juice every day for the vitamins.” However I suspect the real reason was emotional rather than dietary:
Mrs van Andel was a passionate football fan, and supported Ajax of Amsterdam, the Netherlands’ leading team, for most of her life.
(More support for the thesis expounded in How soccer explains the world.)