Battling time and protests, Putin turns 60

MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin hits retirement age on Sunday but he appears determined to prove that 60 is the new 40.

In power since 1999 first as prime minister, then president, then prime minister and now president again, Putin has over the past decade sidelined opponents and in May triumphantly returned to the Kremlin for a historic third term.

As he turns 60, he may be going into the most important battle of his lifetime: the one against time itself.

Faced with the growing opposition movement against his rule, the Russian strongman has refused to step down and never ruled out running for another six-year Kremlin term in 2018.

In what critics say is a bid to prove he's a man in his prime, Putin has over the past few years staged a series of age-defying stunts.

He dived to the bottom of Lake Baikal aboard a submarine, flew a fighter jet, drove a Formula One car, rode a bobsled, paraded a well-toned chest on a holiday in Siberia and most recently took to the controls of a hang-glider to fly with cranes in Siberia.

"Looking at his life, psychologically, he feels young -- he feels 40 and not 60," said blogger and editor of Russky Zhurnal website Alexander Morozov.

While maintaining such a good physique is no small feat by any standards, it is especially impressive in Russia where tobacco and alcohol abuse runs deep and men age quickly.

The general retirement age for men in Russia is 60, while average life expectancy for males stood at 62.8 years in 2009, the latest year for which the data is available at the state statistics service.