Johanna QUAAS, the world's oldest senior gymnast, experienced the 100^th Jahnturnfest 2024 (‘My favourite competition...!’) not as an active competitor this time, but as the official representative of this special anniversary in Germany:
"Oh it was lovely," said the ex-senior gymnast from Halle / Saale, "... to meet so many friends and acquaintances again that I had been with for many years. I would have loved to climb the parallel bars again myself, but unfortunately I haven't done any official competitions for a while now. No, really, there has to be an end to it, but my lifelong sport, my competitions, especially apparatus gymnastics, have given me such a marvellous life, and I've been able to perform to my current age!"

"Thank you for all the congratulations ...!"
I would like to thank everyone very much for all the congratulations on the occasion of my 98th birthday. Also to my guests at my little celebration, with whom I am so closely connected through my sport. I am now particularly looking forward to the 100th Jahnturnfest in Freyburg/Unstrut in August 2024 and, as a representative of this historic event, I hope that it will also be a special destination for many gymnastics fans on the third weekend in August!"
During the celebrations, the birthday party received very good news: Saxony-Anhalt's Minister President Rainer Haseloff invited Hannchen to a reception in Magdeburg to present her with the insignia and certificate of the Federal Cross of Merit, which was awarded to her on 10 July this year by Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier for her achievements and importance in the world of gymnastics.

"And now I am looking forward to the major event in 2024, shortly after the Olympic Games in Paris, to the 100th JAHNTURNFEST in the city of the German gymnastics father, Friedrich Ludwig JAHN, in Freyburg" (2024, August 15 - 18):

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For the 97^th birthday of the world's oldest gymnast, Halle's "Kaffeehaus Wittekind" was quite well attended today! An impressive double-digit number of well-wishers celebrated Germany's best-known gymnastics grandma Johanna QUAAS. "My relatives were there, my wives from the sauna group and a whole lot of gymnasts from my club Post Halle," said the agile lady, "... and the atmosphere was just great!"
Hannchen Quaas still goes to age-appropriate exercise training at least once a week, but her daily bed exercises in the morning followed by her little fitness programme in the fresh air on her balcony are part of her fixed life rituals - just as she was used to all her life, even if the spectacular gymnastic exercises are now history. She has long since recovered from her fracture of the neck of the femur, which occurred on Whit Sunday 2021, and has already been out and about again on her bicycle in suitable weather. Now I would like to greet all participants of the 60th "BLUME-Festival" on Gran Canaria, where I have already taken part several times, and I wish you beautiful days.
For next year, I'm even talking about a trip to the USA, where the opening of a gymnastics museum dedicated to the German gymnastics father Friedrich Ludwig Jahn is imminent. "I am still able to travel, that would be a great thing," says the still fun-loving senior.