Lee Cataluna: Hawaii athletes redefine the point of competing

A summer Sunday morning is about as quiet as the UH-Manoa campus ever gets, but in a corner of an athletic field near the only javelin track in the state, a small group of senior athletes lets their primal screams roar out into the valley as they throw their spears into the air.

Shirley Cruthers, an 81-year-old retired minister, worked on her arm position with coach K.P. Sutton. “If I throw the way I threw today, I will be in the semifinals,” Cruthers said, not at all bragging. She and her teammates mix the fire of competition with a healthy dose of perspective. The team’s goal is “Do your best and don’t come in last.”

This month the Jazzy Javeliers, including Cruthers, Virginia Hinshaw, Colleen Blacktin and Dave Wilson, will compete in the National Senior Games in Albuquerque, N.M. The games attract more than 10,000 athletes who compete in 20 medal sports in a city that is 5,000 feet above sea level with temperatures in the 90s.

Hinshaw, 75, took up the sport three years ago, starting with a broomstick and pointers from her husband, Bill, a longtime USA Track and Field official. She won medals in state games and recruited her friends from their pinochle group to form a team, though none of them had ever thrown a javelin.

“Bill said to throw the javelin like you would throw a baseball,” Cruthers said, “but I don’t think I had ever thrown a baseball in my life.”

Wilson, 75, a former Aloha Airlines pilot who still flies private charters, played sports but not javelin. He regularly throws close to 22 meters. Cruthers is hoping to get to 10 meters, but her best throws are around 9. It’s all core strength, according to Bill Hinshaw. Only 20% of the power comes from the arm. It’s hard to calculate how much the scream factors in.

“My son said to keep my primal scream short because my javelin doesn’t stay in the air that long,” said Hinshaw, UH chancellor emeritus and a professor at the medical school. Hinshaw’s son, Louis, was an all-American decathlete in college and just missed the cut for the Atlanta Olympics. “My son came to see us practice, and he said, ‘I think I can beat all four of you combined.’” He did, with a throw that had a beautiful arc and a perfect midair quiver. “When he did it, it looked like a whole different sport,” Hinshaw said.

They take the sport seriously, but practice is a lot of laughs and one-liners.

“I’m the safety officer, the official, the retriever and the target,” Bill Hinshaw quipped. “Never turn your back to the javelier. That’s rule No. 1.”

This past Sunday, their last practice before Albuquerque, Hinshaw looked over to the student athletic facilities across the way. “They didn’t have sports for girls when I was growing up,” she said. “I watch our female student athletes. They learn how to win but also how to deal with failure. Women in my age group didn’t get that experience. Resilience is one of life’s best lessons.”

Another life lesson, Hinshaw said, is to try new things.

After an hour of throwing and coaching, the team was ready to pack up practice and take final measurements of the flags Bill had used to mark each person’s best throw, but Hinshaw wasn’t done yet. “I have to end with one good one,” she said, motioning for her husband to get out of her line of fire.

She threw a nice one into the air, achieving a hint of that quivering perfection, and it landed with the pointed end stuck in the ground, her longest throw of the morning. “Yay!” she said, and her husband walked over to measure the distance. “Now I get one more try,” she said, and Bill moved out of the way.

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.