 Check it out. Help us report to those events. We won't weigh any more implements in about 15 minutes. The check-in for your event will be at the starting line. That's where we'll get your numbers. The starting line of each event. If you have questions about that, you see me at the red tent are some of the sponsors. Day-rerun with Linda and Charlie Nightseidler. Every transition to greater Portland. AARP in the senior planning center. First call. 50 meters dash. Woman in man. Check-ins at the starting line. First call. High jump. Long jump. Slash. Triple jump. Javlin shot put and discussed. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm about to introduce perhaps my favorite person in the track world. He is my mentor. He is my idol. He is my coach. And thanks to him, I was inducted in the first class of the main senior games hall of fame. My three national medals are thanks to this man. My bronze and my silver today are second and third to him. Roger Pierce, former world champion from Massachusetts running from mass velocity. Roger, I told you about my three national medals. But tell me how many national and world medals do you have? World medals I have 24, 15 of them are gold. And I have 39 national championship medals and 19 U.S. records. And there are other ones too, but... But who's counting, of course? Ladies and gentlemen, my favorite story after taking six in the 400 nationally. I come back to Maine to run in the 400 in 2001, 20 years ago, this very minute. I look to my left and there's a man in an outfit like this. And I ask him, have you ever run this race before? And he says, yes, I'm the world champion. I thought he did it to psych me out, but then he ran as fast as high school kids and beat me. Roger, you also won an award last year or the year before called the Massachusetts athlete of the year award. How do you get that award other than being a great athlete? You know, I didn't know. I was surprised. I run in the Bay State games, which is a yearly thing. And it's open and masters and high school kids. And, you know, they picked the best athlete apparently. And I was shocked out of all the kids and all the open athletes. They gave it to me and I was really shocked at 75 to receive that award. So I'm tickled with that, you know. Imagine folks being 75 years old and winning an award of that magnitude. Roger, you have been also on the cover of many magazines. For some reason, people consider you photogenic. I don't know why, but you've been on the cover of many magazines. Roger, but you also, being an inspiration, you also had some surgery this year. You had spinal surgery. Yeah, spinal surgery to relieve, well, they had to cut into the bone in the back and relieve the nerve pressure. And I had a hernia operation too, you know. And so I'm just now recovering. I haven't really run in a year, almost a year and a half. Folks, Roger's become one of my best friends in life and so we are in frequent contact. So Roger, I mentioned that I'm in the Main Senior Games Hall of Fame, which I'm very proud. But you, sir, are in several Halls of Fame. Tell us what you're in. I'm Beverly High School Hall of Fame. I ran in 1962, that was my senior year, and I'm really proud of that. You know, high school, that's really great to get that. And at Northeastern University I was captain of the team and I was in the Northeastern University Hall of Fame. And the best one, I'm in the USA Track and Field Hall of Fame. And that's awesome. Well, Roger, the other thing is your wife, Diane, who is shy, did not want to be interviewed. She's also a world-class runner and today she won, what, two goals, three goals today? She did. She is running with a full right knee replacement. I had four years ago, which I don't know of anyone who's running with a full right knee replacement. And she's in the Bryant College Hall of Fame. She was an all-American cross-country runner. She was third in the world before she injured herself. She is an awesome runner, but she's very shy. She said, no, you can't talk about me, but I am. She won the San Francisco, no, she won the Buffalo Marathon and was third in San Francisco. She's an awesome woman and I'm so happy to have her as my wife. And Roger, you and she were with my wife and I down in Albuquerque. We had the best time down there. We did. And I just want to tell you folks that I won the silver medal at the same time that my grandson was hitting the state winning championship homerun for Scarborough. We're on the Scarborough Track right now. Roger, before we close, I just want to ask you, do you see yourself in the national senior games like you and I saw in Albuquerque running the 100 meter dash at 100 years old? That's the plan. You know, I want to make it to 100 and I want to break the world record in the 100 at 100. That's the game plan told my wife. So I got a little ways to go. I got what, 23 years to go. Folks, imagine what it's like to have a friend like this. I've been doing this for 20 years and one of my greatest inspirations is the man standing right next to me. You can do this, Bob. You can do this. In the 55 to 59 age group, the gold medal goes to Jennifer, Miko, and the silver to Diane Pierce. And the gold goes to Darcy Emerson, the silver to Rochelle Sipiora, and the bronze to Virginia Haslett. In the 65 to 69, the gold medal goes to Brenda Głowski and the silver to Paula Farnell. Those women can pick up their medals here under the red tent. Okay, I have another inspirational story. Here we are with the main games, main senior games, doing interviews just like in the Olympics, which are happening right now. This inspirational story is about a dear friend of mine who is presently the fastest old man in Maine. He has beaten me in every race, but he is no longer in my age group. So today I took a silver and a bronze thanks to the fact that my friend Arthur Murray was not in the race. Arthur, welcome back. Thank you very much. The story about Arthur is that Arthur had very serious cancer a number of years ago. And yet still competed. But now, and look who comes in here, but still competed. And Arthur, you are now completely cured? Oh yes, cancer is gone, it has not come back in eight years now. It's been eight years. And Arthur, you've been competing, have you been competing since high school? Well, not really. The last meet I actually did, I was in the Air Force. I was back in 1967, and we ran at the University of Duke. I ran for Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. Then from there, I went to NAM, and I did my time in the Air Force and all that. Went back home, I worked for two and a half years, and then I went Navy. And then, you know, I didn't start running again until 2005. And I didn't start competing until 2007. That's when the coaches at Lewis and High School saw me running. And they finally talked me into competing. They wanted to put you on the high school team. Because the ladies in German, Arthur, when he competes in the hundred, the 200, the sprints, he actually runs as fast as some high school kids. That's how fast he's running. And today you won gold in the hundred. Yeah. Gold in the 200. Yes. And he managed to beat a man I'm about to interview next, the world champion, Roger Pierce. Arthur, I used to tell people I was the fastest old guy in Maine. And then you had to come along and beat me. But I'm going to tell you how proud I am to have you as part of the Maine Senior Games. And folks, I have begged Arthur to come down to the Nationals next year. So I can put him on my relay team so I can win another medal in the Nationals. That's how badly I want Arthur to come. Arthur, do you feel that you are running right now at your best even in view of your past condition? Well, I'm trying to do the best I can, you know, with what I've got. I mean, I've been through three knee operations. I've had my gallbladder taken out and, you know, and with the cancer and all that stuff. And I'm just doing the best I can do. Well, so Arthur, we pretty much can consider you, like the movie, The Bionic Man. Arthur Murray, thank you so much. And this is my story about Arthur Murray on me on five, about Maine and its people. Okay, folks, I'm with Kelly and Claire Ryan, whose names I've mixed up a couple of times because they just came off a race. But this story is one of the best Maine Senior Games stories we have. My dear friend, you had a medical episode a number of years ago. Did you not? I did. In April of 2017, I had a major stroke. And, but you came back. You've come back. After a lot of rehab at Maine, general inpatient and outpatient and working on my own in my home gym. I've regained function in my left side, pretty, pretty nearly complete, completely recovered. Well, the inspirational part about this, folks, is that Joe Dill, who runs the Maine Senior Games, said that he was inspired to come back and run this event. You're there. You're the supportive wife. Did you help him through it a lot? You know, he had all the motivation when he got just had a couple of weeks after a stroke and he started physical therapy. His major treatment goal was to participate that summer in the Maine Senior Games and he made it. What's so inspiring is that we're watching the Olympics and we're watching these athletes that have had injuries and you, my dear friend, you had an injury. What events do you do? I do all three throwing events, shot, put, discus and javelin. And, and, but you're not originally from me from Oakland now, right? But originally from where? We originally from the Midwest. We moved here six years ago from South Dakota. Now, I was born in Omaha, Nebraska. Claire is originally from Montreal. If you're following all this, we met when we were both residing in South Dakota, married. And upon retirement, we moved here six years ago to join two of our children here in Maine and grandchildren. Okay. And what events do you do? I just told you what events you did, but what is your age? That's what I meant to ask. I'm 71 years old. He's 71, folks. And let's face it, even if you do a close-up on this man, he looks 51. Seriously, when he came over, I thought I almost said to myself, you cannot be in the Maine senior games. You're too young. What an inspirational story. I want to thank you, folks, so much. And I look forward to seeing you both at many senior games to come. Thank you. Hello and welcome back to me on five. I hope you enjoyed my show with Jamie Logan. We call her Jeopardy Jamie, double winner on Jeopardy. But we're switching gears here, doing the Maine senior games, part one. I'm just so proud, ladies and gentlemen, to have been inducted in the Maine senior games 2015 Hall of Fame. A member of the first class of inductees. Probably the greatest honor I've ever received in my life next to the legendary lawyer award. But with me is the person that I consider responsible for my success here in the Maine senior games. She's like a coach to everybody on these teams, not just track and field where we are today, but everything, basketball, softball, bowling, golf, whatever sport you want to pick. Joe, you are without question the best executive director in the country. Thank you. Thank you, Jerry. And Joe, how many athletes do you think we have here today for the track? I think we had about 105. Oh my goodness. That's a pretty good year. Yes, a great year. And would that be because this is a qualifying year for the Nationals? I think, A, it's qualifying, but also B, we didn't have anything last year and I think people are really anxious to get out again. Joe, I mentioned that you've been the executive director for a good at least half of my games. How many years have you been the executive director? This is my 14th. The 14th year. Folks, I better tell you, I loved it before Joe came in and then when she came in, she changed the whole process. How many different sports approximately do we have for the main senior games? We have 22 days of events, so probably 20 events. 20 events. So folks, I'm going to take my camera crew to a few of the other events. But Joe, one of the things that I want to say on camera is I had the opportunity to watch you play basketball against the toughest team I think I've ever seen. Folks, if you're watching the Olympics, you're watching free-on-free women's basketball. The United States team won it. And the thing they made clear to tell people was how rough it was. And Joe, I could not believe how you folks were being thrown around by those people. Were they from Arkansas or something? Yes. I guess they're right. Yes, I think one of the teams was Arkansas, yeah. Folks, I've got to tell you, you have a player that I consider to be one of the best I've seen all the time. He's a guy, what's her name? She shoots short woman. Linda? Linda, yes. And folks, they were trying to throw her around, but she wasn't putting up with it. And did you folks take a place in that particular event? Not that year. But you did before? Last year we got silver in our age group. Folks, I'm going to tell you, to get silver medal at the Nationals, it's not just a few teams. It's like dozens of teams. Joe, do we think that most of the people that have come back here to these events, many of them, the story is that many of them have recuperated from some injuries. You brought two of them to me today. But a lot of these people have been injured and they recuperate and come back to these games. Right, right. Many, many have had strokes and surgery and knee replacement, hip replacement. And it keeps them going. The main scene of the games, their sport keeps them going. It helps them recover, knowing that they have a goal to work for. Joe, the reason why this is such a fascinating story is because the front page news story today in the country, ladies and gentlemen, in the whole world is Simone Biles, dropping out because of what she considers to be her mental health. And Joe, can we agree that Simone Biles has set the bar for people to realize that if you're an athlete, you can recover? Yes, absolutely, absolutely. She's an amazing athlete and I respect her for what she did. So Joe, we don't have gymnastics because I cannot imagine myself doing a vault or any of that things. But I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. Ladies and gentlemen, one of my fun things today was to go stand on the podium and I actually said the Derry Runlet show and I had forgotten that I sponsored one of the podiums. So my promise to you, Joe, is that as long as I'm around, I will sponsor one of those podiums. Thank you very much. Thank you, Joe. Appreciate it. Okay.