KEEPING THE TRADITION

ALIVE: AGEING MEN IN THE

MASTERS HIGHLAND GAMES

James Bowness

My Sporting History

My ResearchWhat can we

learn from Masters sport?

A LITTLE BIT ABOUT MYSELF

• PhD Research at Glasgow Caledonian University

• GB Representative at the European Indoor

Championships, Prague 2015

• Research interests; sporting lives, the experience

of injury and illness, engagement with risk in sport

A BRIEF SPORTING HISTORY

• Started in 2002 aged 10

• England U12 Fell Running Champion 2003

• Specialised in middle distances (400-1500)

• First national final 800m – 2008

• England and GB Junior debut 2010

• St Mary’s University – 2010-2013

• Glasgow Caledonian University 2013- Present Day

• GB Senior Debut – Glasgow International Jan 2015

• European Indoor Championships 2015

• Ranked 9th in Europe and 19th in World indoors.

ST MARY’S UNIVERSITY 2010-2013

Various injuries; broken scapula,

back alignment issues, neural

problem in the hamstring, Achilles

tendonitis, jumpers knee, occult

fracture in the elbow

Various health concerns; heart

murmur, anaemia, overtraining

syndrome, frequent cold and flu viruses

Leading to reduced performance –

no 400/800/1500 pb’s for 3 seasons

Challenged identity

Reflection on the social

environment of a university athletics

group

Sociological studies as a cathartic experience

MY CURRENT RESEARCH

Master athletes in the Highland

Games.

How they experience bodily ageing in a strength based sporting event.

How ageing men and women

engage with injury, illness and risk.

How participation in this niche sport

gives the individuals a sporting

identity.

MASTERS IN THE HIGHLAND

GAMES

• World Masters Highland Games Championships

• Formally began in 2001

• Take place annually – 14 editions, 3 in Scotland –

11 in USA

• Open to athletes over 40 years old

• Categories for men (above and below 200lbs)

and women

14TH MASTERS HIGHLAND GAMES

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS, INVERNESS

September 11th-14th 2014

169 competitors – 14 countries

34 women 135 men

Various age group categories

Weight categories for men

8 events throwing weights for height

and distance as well as caber toss

METHODS

12 unstructured life-history interviews

lasting from 25 – 55 minutes

4 days of participant observation

Daily reflective diary entries

6 men and 6 women interviewed

Transcribed verbatim before

analysis

Field notes typed up

LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

Need for more data

Difficulty in finding time for interviews with the participants.

Geographical location of the participants.

Technical terms which required clarification.

More interviews – via Skype

E-mails with those without access to skype

Respondent validation

Contact with some Scottish Masters

THEMES SO FAR..

Support for women in the games

Stories of initiation into the games

The ageing body and risk

National and cultural identity

Community and the membership of a ‘brotherhood’

RELATIONS WITH THE WOMEN

Generally supportive

Men often handing out advice to the women

Not all supportive

HS; Arr it is a sport lets you have to have physical strengths and erm the girls the girls going for that sport are not the slim ones err they are the (makes noise with mouth) let’s say yeh. Erm see coming from track and field and you know the fitness and how the girls look like and erm and apart from the shot put women and so forth and now is another let’s say point of view and I and I mean that erm the girls seeing here they should do the sports and err it is err yeh I won’t say I dislike it but I don’t like it.

WOMEN KEY TO THE FUTURE OF THE GAMES

The need for the games to become more liberal

Elaboration of age categories when required

BR; We encourage them, we solicit them, we train them, you know I mean over in Scotland I don’t think they ever encouraged women to take part, in Scottish athletics it was basically a way for the men to train to be ready to fight.

BR; When it evolved around, originally women wernt even allowed to wear a kilt, they had to wear a kilted skirt, because Scotland considered it cross dressing. We’re a little bit more liberal in the states, and so when I first started messing around with this, there were no women throwing at all, we got it started, there was a bunch of women who wanted to try it and they did good you know

SPORTING HISTORY

Is there a trend between those who participate in the highlands games

and their sporting history

The variety of ways into Masters sport.

Some of the life events which created the environment for this to take

place

Trends in the way these participants arrived at competing in this niche

sport.

SPORTING HISTORY - 1

Continuum of those who had always been physically active and those who ‘randomly’ found the sport later in their lives.

CN; When I was in America we have junior high, then high school then college, in junior high I played the basic American sports which were baseball basketball and track and field things, erm I didn’t enjoy them as much when I got through high school, when I got to leave for university I started playing volleyball fell in love with that as a sport, so at the university level I played NCAA volleyball. Erm I played that for four years and then ended up coaching for 2 years after that. And so ever since then volleyball has been my main sport, but I golf a lot, I play softball like baseball, I bowl and I’m a good competitive bowler, so erm I am involved still in all of those sports but volleyball is my main sport and then I would say just below that I’d say the highland games and then all the others I do for fun with my friends.

SPORTING HISTORY - 2

In contrast to those who had taken a break from physical activity and sport after

formal education had ended

DS; Err no I didn’t do any lifting or track and field and stuff when I was younger, ermI played baseball and American football in school and stuff like that, and then I

was in my late 20s before I started this, so I had a big break in between where I

didn’t really do too much of anything and I didn’t really start working out again

until I got into this.

SPORTING HISTORY - 3

‘Random’ events which sparked participation in the games.

CM- I’ve been watching the games since I was about 18, erm I found I always wanted to compete but figured I wasn’t big enough to compete and then my son, when he was young and I was getting married, I mean when I was getting measured for my new kilt, we were at a games and he said ‘so dad does that mean you’re going to do what those guys do’. Err so he kind of shamed me into it, because I always like to tell him you can’t tell me you can’t do something until you’ve tried it, so a year later I went ahead and tried it-

HS; From the age of about 10 I was involved in that and I finished up in my late 20s, finished up. And then I start again just jogging coming back in the 50s and then in the 60s I start further on with these German masterships in the team business. They called me and well why not come to us and err go with us and throw for us so I said yes ok and so I do I do let’s say sports continuously.

SOCIAL REPRODUCTION – 1

INTERGENERATIONAL

BR; they all join me! My daughter is

a certified highland dance teacher

and she has had as many as 80

dancers perform, we take them all

over the country and err my son is

an athlete, his oldest son is a

Scottish athlete and we’re on the field together we’re the only 3

generation family in the world

throwing

Participation in the games is passed

down through generations within the family unit.

SOCIAL REPRODUCTION - 2

INTRA-GENERATIONAL

DS; Err my wife thinks it’s pretty cool that I do this, you know my kids come out and watch a lot of the time and stuff like that, I’ve even got my wife to do it before, just to try it out, she didn’t, she likes to sit and watch and she didn’t like to compete and my daughter dances and stuff like that so it’s a family event once we got involved and everything like that you know.

CN; Yes she competes some times, err she’s not excited about it, but she enjoys coming and you know it’s like what someone said its sort of like a family, when you go to, when you start going to more and more of them you meet the people and you just enjoy being able to go and the events are usually held in nice park like settings so they are family friendly, so you can bring the family, and friends sit around and have a few beers so yes she enjoys it.

EXPERIENCES OF THE BODY

Discourse of decline (Gullette, 1997)

BR; The ageing process you can deny it, but it’s an accepted fact and when you keep track of the distances you throw or the heights you throw you can say as the years pass how..and of course in athletics is tough on the body and you know you have knees that give you problems and elbows and shoulders and what have you.

Physical activity for maintenance

HS; Well I have no problem doing lets say the sports with the heavy weights for certain but this has to be come along with training err otherwise you can’t handle it, the training Is more or less provides for any endurance, no injuries not endurance. So keep err your body trained and you can go on. Otherwise as much as you can do ok without keeping the erm body getting up in the warming process then going on cold and just throw is absolutely nonsense

BODY MANAGEMENT

Precautions taken with the ageing body

DS; Err yes, I wear a braces and stuff on like my knees and err my wrists and stuff like that to try and keep them healthy and it helps support me so I don’t blow anything, I’m lucky because a lot of these guys at this age have had multiple surgeries and I’m yet to have any so I’ve tried to take pretty good care of myself.

Preparing the body to avoid injury

BR; Yes, arr I’ve got machines err different weight machines and all that sort you know and I got cables up in trees hooked up anvils where you pull and raise the handle up and down the neighbours think im nuts ill be out there pulling on it. But I mean you know we do it all the time, if you don’t you hurt yourself, you know I didn’t do anything worth a darn this morning but I didn’t hurt myself and so that’s good.

THE BODY AND RISK

Ageing of the body as an obstacle or challenge

CM- We have a thrower, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame last year, he has leukaemia most people with leukaemia kind of give up, he is still here competing and has actually gotten bigger and stronger and because that’s our nature, we don’t let, we power through injuries and everything and other things like that we tend to look at it like it’s just another challenge, it’s not an obstacle it’s not a problem its just another challenge

How they talk about pain and risk

Who they talk to regarding pain

Use of sports medicine

PAIN AND MASCULINITY

Pride in injury

Injury to social capital

Victory of mind over body

Somatic intimacy between competitors

Controlled aggression – emphasized masculinity

BR; And our games you will never see anybody throwing a fit, or you’ll never see anybody cussing if they don’t do well. You know its family, and fellowship it’s friendship and that’s why there are so many people here.

THE REORIENTATION OF COMPETITION

Competition perceived as against

ones self

Less intense than non-masters

competition

Possible link between age and

competitiveness?

Collection of data to track individual progression

Use of age groups to encourage competitive spirit

SURROUNDING CULTURE

Culture which is not necessarily

beneficial to health

Surrounding practices, eating

drinking etc

CM; Some of us we just drink,

because this is one of the few sports

where not only is drinking and

smoking allowed, it’s encouraged. Speaking of which, that’s made me

forget the bottle of whiskey I had for

everybody.

THE PERFORMANCE OF NATIONAL

IDENTITY

Wearing of kilts etc.

Consent forms

Genealogy as practice

Some participants no genealogical

link to Scotland

HOMECOMING 2014

Cultural identity and diaspora

Generation of pride amongst the

Scottish and positioning of Scotland

on the global stage

Visceral nature of cultural identity

BR; I tell everybody err Scotland is

not a place it’s a feeling of the

heart, you know you might be 5000 miles away from it but the feeling is

still there, and like I say to people

who wanted to come to inverness

to walk down the river ness and you

know hopefully see nessy you know

it’s a dream they’ve had all their

lives since they were little.

SOCIAL REPRODUCTION OF

NATIONAL IDENTITY

Highland games as a male preserve

passed down from father to son

Desire to maintain a national

identity in the USA’s ‘melting pot’

Difficulties in reproduction of

practices

DG; Yes! Yes! Absolutely, the threat of losing it to the next generation

we don’t have the competitors

coming up like there were before,

there’s maybe 8 or 10 juniors

coming up and that’s it and I’m

looking round saying I’m not going

to allow this to happen in my

lifetime

FEELING PART OF A ‘BROTHERHOOD’

Community important for the men

Networks across the world via the internet

Integral to participation in masters sport

DS; Oh I mean I hope to still be doing it at 80 years old like some of these, you know those two guys who are throwing today, I really hope I’ll still be able to do it and all that other stuff even if I don’t throw I can see myself coming and hanging out, you know a lot of times it’s not the competition you know with these other guys, we will come and hang out and it’s like a brotherhood.

‘A BIG FAMILY’

Delegation of parenting activities to

other parents

Negation of barrier to activity

CM: outside the competitions, me

and my son and he would always

be like 6, I can feel safe enough to

be competing and be like oh where

is our son, and be like oh he’s alright

he is with someone else, everyone

else is watching out for him, if he

does something wrong

BEYOND THE COMPETITORS

Support from wives, friends etc.

Linked to group identity and value

system

Somatic intimacy

CM; We keep it amongst ourselves

but it’s not just the athletes, it’s the

wives, the husbands, the other

spectators, like Erica who got in the

accident, they were like Ching, you

know where she’s at? We need you to go get her, bamm I went and got

her. We all look out for one another.

SOCIAL CLASS

Financial requirements

Time off work

Disposition to physical activity and

travel

‘THE MIRACLE OF PARTICIPATION

Financial barriers to competing

Commodification of time

Underpinned by a national identity

Refusal to comply with ageing

discourse

LIMITATIONS

Is this healthy?

What chance do those with less

economic capital have?

Hegemonic masculinity

Competitive opportunities

CONCLUSIONS

Variety of ways into the sport

Body management with age

Risk taking behaviour and the

avoidance of injury

Re-orientation of competitive desire

Communal feel operating as a

‘family’ unit

Somatic intimacy and brotherhood