April 2026 Athlete of the Month
By Del Moon, NSGA Storyteller
Bonita Robins, 87
Topeka, Kansas
Bowling, Cornhole
Bonita Robbins points to her name on the Humana name wall at the National Senior Games in 2025. Photo courtesy Bonita Robbins.
“Long Live the Challenge” is the motto of the National Senior Games, and the athletes who keep coming back to compete for decades are our best examples for active aging. 87-year-old Bonita Robins is amazed she has been bowling “every bit of 55 years” and has not missed a National Senior Games since 1995.
Bonita is a proud Kansas native, proclaiming, “I was born in Wamego, where the Wizard of Oz Museum is located.” Her journey is particularly inspiring because she shares she is not a natural athlete.
“Oh, heavens no,” she responds to the question. “At field day in middle school, I couldn’t run because I’d get a pain in my side when I started running, so that was it.” While she didn’t do much organized sports, her father wisely guided her to include physical activity in her life.
“He thought that girls needed to have something to do outside, and I was an only child, sitting in the house reading, doing stitchery crafts, that type of thing,” she recalls. “He thought I needed to be out in the sunshine, so he taught me how to pitch horseshoes.”
The activity struck a ringer, and it became the first sport she played regularly. Bonita didn’t begin bowling until after the second of her three children arrived in 1972. Her fitness routine became bowling in the winter and horseshoes in the summer, sometimes playing in as many as five bowling leagues at once.
She has earned local and state hall of fame recognition through her consistent participation and for serving on the local association board and helping run their senior tournaments for 20 years.
Photo courtesy Bonita Robbins.
She also became a certified coach to work with youth. “My Saturday mornings were spent at the bowling alley helping young kids improve their games,” she says. “I look back and think about all the kids that went on and took championships.”
Bonita began competing in the Kansas Senior Games when she aged up and has not missed a biennial National Senior Games since 1995. While she speaks proudly of the 19 national medals she has earned, she says maintaining her health and enjoying social connections through her sporting life are the real rewards. She also had an epiphany that shifted her focus to older adults.
The Senior Games Promise
Bonita says winning gold in her first National Senior Games in San Antonio made her stop and appreciate where she was in her life. “My partner and I were so shocked that we did that on our first try. We couldn’t believe we had done that,” she recalls.
“I looked at her and said, ‘You know what? I’m not real religious, but I’m going to make a vow to God right now. He has given me the privilege of winning this gold medal. I will do everything I can do in the future to promote Senior Olympics bowling, to get other people introduced into it, and follow it as long as I can.’ And that’s what I’ve done.”
When the Kansas Senior Games Advisory Council needed a secretary, she eagerly stepped into the role for 17 years, having had a long career in office administration. She also never misses a recruiting opportunity to tell others about Senior Games. The fact that Bonita has represented Kansas as a flag or sign bearer five times in the Parade of Athletes at Nationals testifies to her popularity and influence.
National Senior Games 2017 Parade of Athletes. Photo courtesy Bonita Robbins.
“This is all terrifically important to me,” she says earnestly. “I have made friends nationwide. I absolutely enjoy seeing them every two years. Sometimes it’s kind of hard to say goodbye when we leave, especially at our age now, because we don’t know if it will be the final goodbye. But you can’t replace that camaraderie. I tell everybody, you have no idea what it’s like until you experience it.”
Bonita also still competes in a second sport at Nationals, first with Horseshoes and now with Cornhole starting in 2022 after the former was discontinued. “I like cornhole. It involves your arm, eye and hand coordination. The bags are lighter than the horseshoes, too,” she explains. And, as years before, she was surprised to win two gold medals in her first try at the 2022 National Senior Games presented by Humana in Fort Lauderdale.
Through it all, Bonita is grateful to have had an active life with few medical problems and to have enjoyed perfect National Senior Games attendance for 30 years. Her advice to others at 87 is simple.
“Stay active. Try to eat healthy. Get a good night’s sleep. Because that’s very important for your body so it can repower for the next day. And every morning I wake up, I say, thank you God for another day.”
