Jarol and Leah Duerksen

For Jarol and Leah Duerksen, table tennis is more than a game, it’s the glue that holds them together and drives their social interactions.It even played a key role in introducing them six decades ago.

“We were both freshmen in 1956 at Multnomah College (now Multnomah University) in Oregon,” Jarol recalls in between their mixed doubles matches in the Broward County Convention Center Friday. “I was walking down the hall one day and heard the ‘ping…ping…ping’ and stuck my head in the door. There were 20 guys and one beautiful babe. And I married her!”

Leah says the reason she chose Jarol is that he is a good loser. “Some guys would never come back or talk to me after I beat them.” 

Ping pong was put aside for 25 years while the couple got busy with life. When they could look again at their pursuing their own passion again, they bought a table in Iowa City but soon discovered there wasn’t room in either of the houses they owned. The solution was obvious to them.

“We ended up selling both of the houses we owned and built a new house around a table tennis court.” 

What?

“Yeah, we told the contractor we wanted to start the design with the basement, which he said he had never heard of before,” Jarol says with a chuckle. “ I wanted a room to be 20 feet wide, 30 feet long, ten feet high with no posts anywhere and lots of lights. And I wanted a heated concrete floor with wood over it!” 

The couple now have two tables in their emporium and invite people to come play and socialize every Wednesday night, and many come from the University of Iowa. “We volunteer with the Friends of International Students program at the university and enjoy having people from all over the world in our home.” The couple placed a world map on one wall and ask any visitors born outside of the U.S. to put a pin on the map with their name. 

“It’s probably more than 300 pins now,” Jarol says. “We had so many from China we had to put up another map and now that one’s getting full!”

The enthusiasts even helped start a university table tennis team eight years ago that went to the national collegiate championships. “But it takes leadership and the best leaders graduated so it will have to be started over,” he muses.

Through 63 years of marriage the couple agrees on Jarol’s advice for others: “Do something together. It doesn’t matter what it is. We do that and we have a lot of fun. We feel we are living the dream.”

Susie Kemp, right, and Sherry Kemp.

By Jennifer Coco

As Charlene Kemp-Queener competed in the javelin and shot put at the 2019 National Senior Games in Albuquerque, her mother Susie Kemp and sister Sherry Kemp sat cheering on the sidelines. Sherry recounts turning to Susie after watching then 103-year-old Julia “Hurricane” Hawkins run the 50-meter race and saying, “You know mom, we can do something.” 

At that moment Sherry and Susie committed to competing in the next National Senior Games, despite the fact that both relied on walkers at the time, and Sherry was on oxygen due to a chronic lung disease that left her with 24% lung capacity..

Spoiler alert: They reached their goal, and then some, through hard work and dedication to fitness. 

All three women are now competing as athletes in the 2022 National Senior Games presented by Humana. Their family sport is Cornhole, and Charlene kept her Javelin and Shot Put competitions. Sherry chose to compete in the 1500M Power Walk and beat her personal best time by two minutes. The most amazing part? She is now off of oxygen and no longer needs a walker! 

“I’m pretty proud of myself, I worked hard,” Sherry shares. “I just had back surgery last June – not even a year ago.” 

You don’t have to look far for another example of strength and overcoming obstacles. Susie is a Korean War veteran who has battled stomach cancer and COVID-19. We know there are many stories to be told in this family, stay tuned for a full feature after The Games!

Introduction of Cornhole Attracts NSGA Staffers

Ed Roberts competes in Cornhole at the 2022 National Senior Games presented by Humana.

The new open sport of Cornhole is making its debut, and two Games staffers decided to jump into the fray. 

Ed Roberts of Fort Worth has been helping the Texas Senior Games with their results processing since his late wife Kay started doing it in 1995 and put the lasso on him to join in. Ed has been handling results quality control at the National Senior Games since 2005, and in 2019 he found time to play shuffleboard to enjoy the Games experience.

Becky Sewell is NSGA’s fulltime Vice President of Athlete Relations, and despite the age difference Ed agreed to “play down” from his 85-89 level to Becky’s 50-54 age group. “We had zero expectations,” Becky laughs, but as luck would have it, they were the only 50-54 team and played in a larger pool of 55-59. That means both have gold medals around their necks now and had a throng of other staff members on hand to congratulate them.

We knew what question to ask Ed Roberts, a true Texan to the bone: Was winning a gold medal as good as getting some slow cooked Texas BBQ brisket? His answer was immediate. 

Becky Sewell, NSGA Vice President of Athlete Relations.

“No!” 

He then adds, “But it was a lot of fun and Becky was a great partner.”

Becky becomes the second fulltime NSGA staffer to actually compete in the National Senior Games, following Media Director Del Moon who started Power Walking in 2019. “It’s fun to feel like I’m a little more connected to the athletes,” she says. “Maybe we’ll do it again!”

Over 650 athletes are serving their best shots at the 2022 National Senior Games presented by Humana Tennis competition hosted at the Veltri Racquet Club. We posed a question to a few of these devoted athletes to see how staying active through tennis competition has benefited their lives.

How has playing tennis, being involved in the Senior Games, and generally staying active impacted your life? 

Rodney Jackson, 50

Missouri

Editor’s Note: Rodney started playing tennis at 50, and these National Senior Games were his first tennis competition ever! We look forward to seeing him back in Pittsburgh.

“Tennis is such a fun sport, and it allows you to maintain your mobility and maintain focus. You want to work on your game to improve. Being here at the senior games has given me that spirit to want to improve for next year’s games because the guys in my age bracket are really good!”

Nicole Christina, 60

New York

“It helps me stay vibrant, engaged, and happy. It’s an absolute delight to do it. My friends are here – it’s exercise, it’s strategy so it’s good for my brain. It also gives me structure and has helped during COVID. I can’t imagine life without tennis, it’s my absolute love.

Diane Kinderwater, 65

New Mexico

“The philosophy of senior games is to encourage us to try not only the sport we’re comfortable with, but to expand and try other sports, and we have done that, truly due to the senior games. It encouraged us to try table tennis, badminton, corn hole – it really opened up a bigger world of sports to us that we may not have done.”

Christina Cook, 61

New Hampshire

“It’s the way to go. Tennis has been great, it’s a very social activity – I usually play doubles. And meeting all the people who are like-minded is wonderful. I’m also doing cycling and have met people from all over the United States. It’s been really fun…We were having breakfast the other day at the hotel and watching all the horrible things on the news and we were looking at each other going, ’This is where everybody needs to be. Where everybody is positive and wants to feel good and do.”

Rick Barker, 65

New Mexico

“It’s impacted me tremendously. So much joy and so much satisfaction with the Senior Games – meeting everyone from all the states. It’s a super organization and this is a super nice venue, just dial down the humidity and it would be perfect!”

By Nick Gandy, Florida Senior Games

Dave Zarco, National Senior Games badminton sport director.

If there’s a badminton event going on in South Florida, it’s a pretty good bet that Dave Zarco, of Miami, is going to have something to do with it.

A Florida Senior Games badminton player and sport director, Zarco has served as the National Senior Games badminton sport director since 2007. He is also “stringing racquets,” for athletes at the Broward County Convention Center.

Zarco had a chance to play mixed doubles with someone in need of a partner, but opted to find another partner for the player in need.

“Something would have suffered if I played,” the selfless Zarco admitted.  “More than likely it would have been the racquet stringing for the athletes. I’ve played in plenty of National Senior Games.”

Following a trip to the 2005 National Senior Games in Pittsburgh, Zarco stepped into the sport director role in 2007 and has occupied the position since.  He was a Men’s Doubles gold medalist in the 2003 National Senior Games in Virginia Beach, with Dudley Chen, also of Miami, and won a bronze medal in Men’s Singles.  

Chen, who assists Zarco with his administrative duties at the National and Florida Senior Games, is teaming with Andrew Williams in the 65-69 age group Men’s Doubles event.

Besides his duties at the Broward County Convention Center, Zarco leads a Sunday morning open badminton program for anyone interested at Shula’s Athletic Club, in Miami Springs.  Zarco worked with Bill Graham, a badminton enthusiast and brother of former Florida Governor, Bob Graham, to make the facility more badminton friendly than normal gymnasiums.

He has also coached the Miami Palmetto High School Badminton team for the last 13 years. Miami-Dade County is the only county in Florida to offer badminton at the high school level, with 20 schools competing.

“In the 13 years I’ve coached, we’ve never finished lower than third in the county,” Zarco said. “We have been county champions six times and demolished the competition at this year’s tournament. Our team members combined for 21 points and the second-place team had nine points.”

Miami-Dade County has offered high school badminton since 1950 and Zarco played for the Palmetto High School team in 1969 and 1970. Only two other states, California and New York, offer boys and girls high school badminton programs, like Miami-Dade County.

“I drive 25 miles to coach at my alma mater,” he said. “My players are the smartest kids in the school. I’ve turned mathletes into athletes.”

Besides Zarco and the current County Badminton Champions, other notable Palmetto High School alumni include Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, and pop star Camila Cabello.

Badminton is documented as the fastest racket sport with birdies (shuttlecocks) traveling more than 200 mph. Between Zarco’s wealth of experience in the sport and the skills of his mathletes at Palmetto High School, they can come up with a way to further demolish their South Florida competition.