Not One of the Guys. One of the Athletes.
Tossing Bean Bags with the Boys (Cornhole #6)
Hello friends! Welcome, new subscribers! Shout-outs to my friend Bruce, cousin Linda, sister Brenda, and others supporting my quest for cornhole excellence.
Funny: By day, I’m a warrior for women’s rights to female-only sports. By night, I play coed cornhole.
Every athletic arena feels like home to me.
But last Tuesday, after Bruce and I arrived at a Toss4Vets cornhole tournament hosted by the American Legion Post #17, in Lewes, Delaware, I grew anxious as I watched other players warm up. Several slid bag after bag directly into the hole. How would I fare? The boards looked very far apart.
Funny: By day, I’m a warrior for women’s rights to female-only sports.
By night, I play coed cornhole.
The First Four Games
During the first half of the evening, each player was matched with four different doubles partners for four games. I desperately tried to land my bags on the board (one point) or, better yet, in the hole (three points).
Computerized results after those early rounds revealed that I ranked thirteenth, or second worst of the fourteen players. (The worst was another of the five women.)
The Next Five Games and Tornado
For the second half, the worst player was paired with the best, the second worst with the second best, and so on. The second-best finisher was Tornado, so he became my doubles partner for the rest of the evening. Here we are.1
As play proceeded, Tornado and I took turns. A man of few words, Tornado observed me, offering subtle encouragement with nods and small smiles. Sometimes, when my bag landed more or less where I wanted it to, he’d say “Good bag” – a high compliment in cornhole.
We lost our first game, 21-14. But we won our next game thanks to Tornado’s ability to place the bag precisely, even rolling it like a miniature all-terrain vehicle over opponents’ bags that obstructed its path.
Every sport offers its own aesthetic beauty. Check out the “sliders” in this short video to see bean bags spinning, then oozing quietly into the hole like mercury. Captivating, don’t you think? Or is it just me?
“Any Tips for Me?”
Between Games Two and Three, Tornado stepped out for a smoke. When he returned, I asked if he might offer me any tips. Like any good teacher, he patiently met me where I was (novice) without showing off his own fancy shots such as the “roly poly” or the “hooker.” He covered the basics: “flat bag,” “airmail,” and “driver.” Then he handed me the bags and gently critiqued my practice.
As we resumed play, my confidence grew and my shoulders began to relax.
“Are my tips helping?” Tornado asked at one point.
“Absolutely.”
The Twelve-Pack
Soon after the lesson, I slid all four of my bags into the hole (called a “twelve-pack” because it’s worth all twelve possible points for that round), something I’d never done before.2 After winning that game, Tornado astonished me with, “That deserves a hug.” Which felt great.
But after the next game, in my newbie nervousness, I somehow thought the night was over, and gave Tornado an exuberant hug to thank him for all the fun. Whoops. The awkward half-embrace landed like a “shortbag” – which thuds noisily in front of a board like a head-on collision.
Tornado and I lost our fifth game and were eliminated. (No more hugs. Fistbump.) By progressing that far, we finished in third place — and won prize money! Ten dollars each: our entry fees returned.
By then, Bruce and I had been at the event for four hours. As possibly the oldest competitor, I was exhausted. But we stayed to watch as a two-man team (Drew S. and Randy C) won first place, narrowly defeating Gretchen W. and her male partner, Terry, in an exciting final.
Cross-Cultural Collaborations
When, in January, I registered to play in the women’s 65-69 age group at the National Senior Games, coming up this August in Des Moines, Iowa, I wasn’t expecting to compete against men in the months leading up to those games. My only goals were to learn a new sport, test my skills against my age- and sex-group peers, and reclaim a sense of myself as an athlete.
It only dawned on me recently that cornhole is mostly a coed sport.
But wait. Why coed? The game involves throwing bean bags toward a board twenty-seven feet away. Men have more upper-body strength than women. Why no separate female category in most tournaments?
Because there aren’t enough female players yet. It’s a growing sport – included in the 2023 World Games, with Olympic advocates making their appeals – but 75 percent of the players are male, and most players don’t compete beyond tailgates and backyards. At the nascent pro level, there are 200 men and only 32 women. The world championships offer a female category, but many tournaments do not.
Therefore, women and men usually compete together. Women do tend to compensate for relative lack of upper-body strength by using longer or faster backswings or taking a step forward to generate more power, but styles vary across both sexes and all that matters is where the bean bags land.
When the stakes are low and everyone agrees to that format, coed sports offer unique pleasures. For men, coed sports can help them appreciate women’s talents, tenacity, and toughness – a good thing for both sexes. For women, coed sports can be empowering: a time to forget that we’re physically “the weaker sex” and just play. (Paradoxically, single-sex sports offer women this same freedom.)
When all goes well — as it did on Tuesday night — a woman competing with men on an equal basis doesn’t feel like one of the guys.
She just feels like one of the athletes.
Thoughts? I love hearing from you.
See also Cornhole Parts One, Two, Three, Four, and Five in the #Aging Up series.
I’m planning to practice five times a week, throwing about 200 bags each day, for ten-plus weeks, for 10,000-plus throws before the National Senior Games.
Way to go! By August, you’ll be unstoppable!
I really enjoyed this. It almost makes me want to take up the sport—emphasis on the word "almost." I couldn't help but notice that the 2 women in the video were both left-handed. That's going to be my excuse for not joining in the fun. I find my right-handedness most useful for lifting my beer glass.