In Which This Athlete Signs Up for the National Senior Games in Guess Which Sport? (Cornhole #1)
Athletes Need to Compete.
Hi friends and welcome newcomers!
My friend Ruth, 71, announces at a dinner party that she qualified to compete in six swimming events in the upcoming National Senior Games this summer in Des Moines, Iowa. “Plus relays,” she adds, grinning.
I leap out of my seat to a standing, commanding position.
“Willie.” I declare to one of our hosts. “We have to sign up.”
My friends have been telling me about the National Senior Games for years. Judy Wetzel is a golf champion whose grandson, also a golfer, brags about his “badass grandma” because she shot her age (79) this year. She qualified for the Games. Jane Pittman, 70, a filmmaker who created the brilliant senior-women’s-basketball film Coming Back to the Hoop, qualified to play basketball. Helen White, 72, who co-founded the NOVA United Senior Women's Basketball Association, will play pickleball. She attended her first Games twenty years ago, at 52. “It’s a life-changing experience,” she says.
Athletes don’t just enjoy competition. We need it, like dolphins need the sea.
I used to say, “I wish I could participate, but I can’t.” Even after three knee surgeries, my knees can’t handle running or jumping, so that eliminates basketball, volleyball, tennis, pickleball, and more. Even after two shoulder surgeries, I had to quit masters swimming in my forties because my shoulders still sublux: a type of dislocation. I gave up golf for the same reason in my fifties.
I’ve tried physical therapy. I’ve tried meds. I’ve tried grieving. I’ve tried noncompetitive swimming, rowing, cycling.1 I’ve tried focusing on a different goal: lifelong fitness.
But competition is how athletes feel most alive, alert, focused, joyful. Athletes don’t just enjoy competition. We need it, like dolphins need the sea.
There Must Be a Way to Sign Up.
Aren’t most senior athletes facing physical limitations? There must be a way to join this biannual Senior Games adventure.2
The problem is, to compete at Nationals, you have to qualify at your state senior games, which have already concluded.
“But for a few sports, there are no qualifying criteria,” Ruth volunteers.
“Ooh, like what?” I’m already googling so fast I almost drop the phone. “Open sports that do not require qualifying,” I read aloud: “Basketball Shooting Skills. Beach Volleyball. Billiards. Powerlifting. Cornhole. Soccer.”
Basketball Is So Yesterday
“What do they mean by basketball shooting skills?” asks Willie. She and I met while coaching girls’ basketball together in the nineties.
“Twenty-five free throws.”
“I forget how to shoot,” says Willie. She and I both played college basketball, but it’s been a minute.
As for me, I’ve been undefeated in HORSE since 1982.3 Could I make 25 free throws in a row? I’m tempted to find out. But free throws do not call to me like….
The Perfect Sport: Cornhole
“Cornhole!” I declare. “Doubles.”
“Wait, what’s cornhole?” asks another friend.
“That backyard or beer garden thing with wooden boards and bean bags,” explains someone else.
“I’m in,” says Willie. Bless her.
“Does this mean Katherine and I have to go to Iowa?” asks Wendy, Willie’s spouse. We live in Virginia.
“You get to go,” I say, trying to reframe it as a privilege.
“One thousand miles to watch you two play cornhole?” asks Katherine, my spouse.
Why Cornhole?
Because Willie and I are already East Coast Doubles Champions. Have I mentioned that? Ha ha. Kidding. I’ve only played cornhole twice. Ever.
Because cornhole is our speed. Willie has had more joint replacements than I can count.
Because “I’m planning to play cornhole in a national competition” sounds hilarious. No offense to serious competitors. I might become one.
Because cornhole is fun. You launch a bean bag into the air – a bowling motion with your arm, a frisbee spin with your hand, according to this video – then wait breathlessly to see if it falls through the hole. Sounds like basketball but without the hassle of rebounding. You also get to be a meanie, aiming your bags at opponents’ bags to scoot them out of the way.
Why Doubles?
Like many things, sports are more fun with friends.
A Small City Filled with Fit, Happy, Old Athletes
Pre-Title IX women finally get their chance to shoot.
They’re not going to miss their shot.
That evening, I log onto the American Cornhole Association and order cornhole bags for Willie and me. I choose the Synergy Pro model “for serious competitors, aspiring pros, and high-stakes cornhole tournaments.”
Picture this: Des Moines is expecting 11,500 athletes between the ages of 50 and 100. Everywhere, proud, muscular, gray-haired women and men with good posture will be happily telling stories and hugging and sharing high fives. Picture strong, old pole vaulters and javelin throwers launching themselves or sharp objects into space. Toned, crone volleyball players leaping to spike balls.
At the National Senior Games, pre-Title IX women finally get their chance to shoot, and they’re not going to miss their shot. A small city filled with fit, energetic, elder athletes: former champions, current champions, future champions. Inspiring, right? These are my people.
How about you? Are these your people? Let me know if you’re going. I could host the first in-person Stronger Women party. Register here.
Now I’ve got to go meet Willie for our first practice.
Other Stronger Women stories you might enjoy:
Recovery: A Love Story: Swimming Through Rough Waters with a Lifelong Friend
A lifeguard saw us as two old, frail women. We knew better.
Dear Reader: On Strength and Vulnerability: When combined, these qualities can become a north star guiding us through life.
Do I Look Like a Water Aerobics Person? &
A Funny Thing Happened When I Stopped Resisting
A two-part story of my athletic identity crisis at the pool.
I think of these as the sitting and floating sports.
I’m not disabled enough to compete in their “non-ambulatory” sports, but they offer four of those, too.
Lately I’m averaging one game every ten years, only when someone else insists. And yes I do recall when someone beat me. Cynthia Something, at a party.
I was wondering if there’s a senior athlete impersonator category. And if that’s a team sport…👥👯♂️🤦🏼☺️
I was so in until the part about men and women with "good posture." I didn't have that even when I was younger. While I thought I was taking modern dance to turn "pro," my dance teacher told my mother she thought I was there to improve my posture. lol