Santa Barbara’s Sally Saenger Has a Lifelong Passion for Fitness

Riding the Wave as a Senior Fitness Ambassador

By Leslie Dinaberg | August 25, 2022

Sally Saenger teaches a swim class at Los Baños during the pandemic. | Credit: Courtesy

Read all of the stories in “Our 2022 Active Aging Guide” here.

With the NCAA allowing college athletes to start earning profits from their likenesses, sponsorship deals have gotten a lot of press recently — but Gen Z doesn’t get all the glory. Santa Barbara athlete and fitness instructor Sally Saenger was named a 2022 Senior Planet Sponsored Athlete at age 66. A competitive surfer and a member of the PE department at Santa Barbara City College since 1982, in addition to teaching both credit and noncredit classes in town, with this award Saenger has added senior fitness ambassador to her résumé.

“I liken it to being Miss America or something because you have to make appearances, so to speak, on their website and do a couple of blogs and lead a couple presentations,” said Saenger of her Senior Planet responsibilities. “My presentation was very successful; they had a lot of people that were interested in it because it was about balance for seniors. And that’s always of interest for older adults.”

At a recent fitness event, Sally Saenger shows off what could be her motto: “Aging with Attitude.” | Credit: Courtesy

That presentation, which evolved out of a class she teaches for SBCC School of Extended Learning, then evolved into a series of four sessions of online classes that became so popular that Saenger is now teaching for Senior Planet — a program created and sponsored by the national nonprofit Older Adults Technology Services (OATS), which formally joined the AARP family as a charitable affiliate in 2021 — and working for AARP.