At five years into my current bicycling career I am setting a faster pace than I have gone since I was under thirty. I don't have records of time and distance from my career during the bike boom of the seventies.

The only comparison I can make is that I did two centuries in my twenties and I probably couldn't do that now but it is one of my goals this year or next.

From my perspective I am just getting better right now.

OTOH I find a decline is preferable to an incline when it regards altitude. Still, if you only ride downhill you will never see home again.