Athletes wanted: age 70 and older

As a child, Lollie Guiney lived for sports, still embraces sports, and aims to get other septuagenarians involved in sports.

Guiney, a Hoffman Estates Park District commissioner with almost 11 years of service to her credit, holds several gold and silver medals in basketball and more than 100 gold, silver and bronze Illinois State qualifying medals in track and field.

As a child, she lived outdoors playing street football, sand lot softball, and jungle basketball. She also was fearless.

"The metal maypole on our school playground was a death-defying piece of equipment," Guiney recalls. "You'd get a few friends together and cross the chains over each other, and then you ended up flying flat out. I don't remember anyone's getting really hurt even with the gravel landing pad."

In high school, she played volleyball and half court basketball. She says she did fine in her classes, but "my favorite subject was gym" in her all-girls school. In her senior year, her sister Shannon Niemann and some friends formed a fastpitch team, with Guiney as the pitcher and Niemann as catcher.

Her fascination for athletics continued when she worked at Western and Southern Life Insurance Company, which sponsored basketball and slowpitch softball.

Already involved in fastpitch, she soon joined the company's slowpitch team, defying expectations that one can't play the two sports at the same time. She says that year she batted .1000 -- 600 in slowpitch and .400 in fastpitch.

After raising her children, the sportswoman returned to her games, sometimes with the Hoffman Estates Park District, and other times "outside the organized realm of sports," eventually getting involved with the Senior Olympics in track and field.

"I had no experience in track and field, and consider myself self-taught," Guiney said.

Guiney is a native of Cincinnati, but a resident of Hoffman Estates with her husband Tom for 45 years. They have five children: John, Terry, Kristie, Julie and Patrick.

The community leader, who seeks team members for three-on-three basketball, inquires if there are other sports-loving women at least 74 years old who want to play basketball. She points out that "it's OK to be rusty or out of shape, but it's also OK to have fun and meet other women in the process."

Eventually, the team will go to Springfield to qualify for the National Senior Games, with San Diego as its ultimate destination.

"It's amazing to see the seniors and the energy they expend," Guiney said.

For more information, contact Guiney at (847) 885-7500 or lcmng630@aol.com.