Former Elma track coach Paul Roberts’ daily routine isn’t like most people his age, but then again, he isn’t your average 74-year old.

Roberts is still an athlete after all these years and showed that his long jump skills are still top notch with a gold-medal winning distance of 2.12 meters in the Huntsman World Senior Games on Oct. 16.

Roberts’ also took gold in 2018 in the standing long jump with a distance of 2.21 meters, making him a back-to-back champion in the event in the 70-74 age group.

In his last year in the age group, Roberts is still going strong and looking for ways to push his body to its limit.

“I always do maintenance squats during the year,” he said. “I always do slow half-squats, but then when I start preparing three or four months before I start doing jump squats. I put 105 pounds on my back and I try to jump as high as I can until I can’t go anymore. You have to wake up the next morning stiff or you didn’t work.”

Roberts, who lives in Elma, doesn’t yet see an end to an athletic career that started when he was a child. His father encouraged him to perfect his long jump technique when he constructed a long-jump pit in the backyard of their Coulee City home in 1953.

Growing up in the desert of eastern Washington meant track and field practice took a back seat to actual work in the field as Roberts spent a lot of time helping with the family farm growing up.

Roberts said time spent on the farm gave him an appreciation for school work that in a lot of ways inspired him to come to Elma for a teaching job in 1965.

“Other people hated school and I loved school, it was way better than the farm work. I grew up in the desert of eastern Washington and I drove combines in sixth grade,” he said. “Once you drive the open air combine all summer, in the tractor doing dry-land farming in Douglas County, school was like heaven. You can have the farming, I left and came over (to Elma).”

When he wasn’t practicing for the long jump or operating a tractor, Roberts spent a lot of his time on the basketball court. Roberts’ first love was basketball and he was named to the all-state team in 1963, but his basketball prowess didn’t translate to any gold medals at high school track meets.

Once he found out he could compete in the standing long jump later in life, he leaped at the opportunity in his early 60s.

“I never went to state in track and I wasn’t that good in the long jump, but the standing long jump has always been a masters or senior event,” he said. “It used to be in the Olympics until 1912 but now in the Senior Games, they have it and I’ve been participating since I was 63.”

In addition to his own success in the event, Roberts has also been able to pass along his track and field knowledge to a few generations of Elma High School athletes.

Elma graduate Brandi Thomas was one of the track athletes who worked under Roberts during her high school career, winning the 2A state title in the triple jump in 2008-09.

Thomas said she knew she wanted to participate in track and field as a freshman and immediately got extra encouragement from Roberts when she showed up at practice.

“I knew I wanted to long jump and he took one look at me and said, ‘I’m going to teach you how to triple jump.’ I gave it a shot and I stuck with it for four years, so I’m very thankful he taught me how to triple jump. I’ve grown to love it ever since.”

Though Thomas graduated high school in 2010, she and Roberts still maintain a close relationship and attend local sport events together.

Ever the coach, Roberts still likes to check to make sure his former state-champion protege is getting her workouts in.

“Every time I see him he asks, ‘Have you been squatting? Have you been working out and dead lifting?’” she said. “He’s always checking on me to see if I’m doing those things as well because I know he’s built himself a little squat rack in the back yard. He’s still checking on me to make sure I’m keeping up.”

After 44 years in the Elma School District, Roberts retired in 2011 and now spends a lot of time traveling when he’s not working out at his homemade squat rack.

Roberts’ medals aren’t prominently displayed in his home, with just a few of his most recent ones hanging in his dining room, but he thinks he knows what it takes to add to his championship hardware next year.

“If you look back on how I’ve been since 64, I’m dropping an inch-and-a-half a year so if was to be above six feet 10 inches next year that would be pretty good,” he said. “That would be enough to beat the guys in 75-79.”