YOUR FITNESS
JAMM AQUINO / JAQUINO@STARBULLETIN.COM
Pete Gaskill flashes a smile before taking to the field in a game against Mokulele.
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Senior has a ball playing for team on soccer circuit
Teamwork, camaraderie, staying fit and winning appeals to older athletes
Pete Gaskell is the elder statesman on a team of, well, elders.
The 60-year-old Gaskell, the team manager and oldest player of Honolulu United -- in the men's Island Soccer Organization -- carries the same mentality of just about everyone else on his 25-man squad in the 45-and-older division.
"The one thing I am realizing as I get old, you don't play soccer to stay in shape. You gotta do something else to stay in shape so you can play soccer. "
Pete Gaskell
60-year-old manager of Honolulu United
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"Don't ever change," is the team's motto emblazoned on its uniforms, and Gaskell and his teammates do the best they can to live up to it.
Namely, they stay fit to play the game that they love.
It's a way of life for Gaskell, a retired battalion chief with the Honolulu Fire Department who grew up in Connecticut. Even after two years at Cornell University and moving to Hawaii in 1968, soccer has been his obsession.
Now, he has taken up biking to remain competitive with the 4-0-1 United, currently in first place in the league.
"The one thing I am realizing as I get old, you don't play soccer to stay in shape," Gaskell said. "You gotta do something else to stay in shape so you can play soccer. In the fire house, I did volleyball and a little bit of stationary bike, but volleyball was terrible on the knees. I'm not a sit-down-in-the-weight room kind of a person, which I should do, a tremendous benefit there, but I try to stay active doing things I enjoy."
JAMM AQUINO / JAQUINO@STARBULLETIN.COM
Gaskill is a retired firefighter, and keeps in shape by playing in an over-50 soccer league.
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For four years now, he and his United teammates have enjoyed dominating MISO. They've won seven of nine championships (which happen twice a year) since entering for the first time in 2003.
They're a familiar group, many going back to their high school days at Punahou, Iolani, and Kalani, among other places, where some members of the team played with and against each other in fierce rivalries. These days, they're mostly content to mess with each other during once-a-week practices at Kapiolani Park. It's Gaskell's task to get everyone together for those.
But during the weekends -- on either Friday or Saturday at Ala Wai Field or Waipio Peninsula Soccer Park -- the league's true competitive fire is laid bare. While many of the league's players don't have the speed, agility, or command they once had, by spending years playing with each other, the league's players have developed into cohesive units. Today, more than ever, they need all the cohesion they can muster against a never-ending influx of 45-year-olds.
"The level of play is good," said United's Malcolm Yee, 48. "In fact, it's gotten a lot more equal. Each of the teams on any given day can beat each other. There's some really good players."
Gaskell believes that everyone on their roster is self-motivated to keep their play at a level to compete, and his teammates are liable to agree.
"Most of the guys care about being in shape and about taking care of themselves," pointed out Punahou graduate Oren Schlieman, 52, who designed the team's logo: Diamond Head (to symbolize a constant, just like their play) above crossed paddles (to symbolize teamwork).
"A lot of our parents were athletes, so we kind of grew up with that. You keep in shape and you keep in condition because it helps you enjoy life."
JAMM AQUINO / JAQUINO@STARBULLETIN.COM
"I should have a few more years left," Gaskill says. I'd like to say 10 more years if I'm lucky. I would like to keep going as far as I can."
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As 54-year-old teammate Kenan Knieriem puts it, "I hate running, but I run to play for soccer."
Gaskell is actually behind three or four players for the honor of the league's oldest, according to division coordinator Vic Peters. But that's good enough to command the respect of everyone else on the United roster, despite the firefighter's soft-spoken nature.
"Absolutely (we look up to Pete)," said team captain and goalkeeper Keith Ridley, 53. "He's our team manager. He helps to keep us in line a bit. Not only as an elder statesman, because he's..." paused Ridley, a 1971 Saint Louis graduate, before laughing. "At our age we don't need the drill sergeant. (Along with player-coach Lloyd Nishimoto) he understands the individual talents people bring to the team and helps to massage those talents into a cohesive team."
That's no small task, since many of United are a current or former soccer coach at some level, be it AYSO, high school, or college. Peters, who also plays for rival Real Hawaii FC, attributes United's unprecedented success -- it has more division titles than all the other teams combined since it began in 2001 -- to great teamwork.
Gaskell drew upon his experience coaching at both Kalani and Kaiser High Schools to help mold his stoic style of influence. Meanwhile, the guys will continue to mix it up one day out of the week.
"That's why I try to get out here and give these guys a little inspiration that there is a little bit more to life to keep going for," Gaskell said, smiling. "I should have a few more years left. I'd like to say 10 more years if I'm lucky. I would like to keep going as far as I can."
His United teammates will be there with him every step of the way.