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Show BQwDVV il by TANYA LEE I Never To Old At 58, Tom Cooka was the oldest student athlete u Northland km; last July, Cooka woo Senior Olympics in National age group at die gold in die 10K nee far die chat Bauxi Rouge, La. It was die high point of a running career already has spanned nowhere in sight. mote than 60 yean, and the end is Cooka, die m of lews lather from die village of Hano and a Hopi mother from Hotevilla, was one of seven children onthe family ranch near Kearns Canyon, on the Hopi Reservation in northeastern Arizona. When Cooka was just 5, his father woke him before dawn one morning and announced that it was now the boys job to gather up die hones pastured overnight, roughly four miles from the ranch. Young Tom would go out, find them, and then too little to catch and ride one would chase them home. I hated it," he admits, but it was really a blessing because that's what started me running.'' Pioneer College in Arizona. Thirteen years 70-7- 4 DEAN MARTIN Sings Country! 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Only S17.9S fdus 1CD(AKM pAh. Tel ua whether yon MretaOnridarnr an and nal yonrchect wade out to Mdhhets Choice along tee tee n $3-0- withyovnanieredaddaereOraliaMneandoNleraajmraedlicaid.l'MMTiMlM. Box 4174, Dept AUG-A- B nanrtnglna Station, NY 11746 V not anMy deS0n& yon aay senna yarn putdaae fcr a pnrept Ktond of the qneatore atodl CA ad SY andean pkaw add nks tn. Sanbcdan Gonreiecd. pudme prior-- ad thrce-and-a-h- alf cross-count- ry on dm. During World War II, his dad went to work for the railroad and the family moved fo Winslow, Adz., 70 miles south of the reservation. Cooka joined the track team ax Winslow High School and, upon graduation, served in the Air Force as an airborne radio operator in Korea for years. Through it all there was one I I constant: Wherever was," he says, always kept tunning. Cooka planned to go to college and tty out for the Olympics after the military, but marriage and a family made him set those goals aside. Like his dad, he went to work for die railroad. I lived out of a suitcase, he says, "working little one-ma-n stations in Grants, Skull Valley, Castle Hot Springs, Seligman, Peach Springs, and dozens of other little towns along die route. I always said if a better job came along, Fd take it, but it never did. By then Cooka's family was growing, and growing up. He and his wife, Mildred, raised six children, and the four boys became Cooka's running partners. Wed go to the track together it was a family thing," he says. In 1988, a few years before he retired, Cooka derided it was time to begin to fulfill his boyhood dreams. He enrolled in Northland Pioneer College in Winslow and asked to join die team. The only way they would let me do it is ifI took a M course load, says Cooka. So 1 went to school full time at night, worked during die day, and tried out for track. He made the team, though he was 40 years older than most ofhis teammates. While Cooka attended Northland, his youngest son, Terence, was enrolled at Mesa Community College, also in Arizona. The two schools competed in trade, and inevitably, Cooka wound up running pgainst his son. He beat me every time, Cooka admits. Id been running against my dad all my life, says Terence, so it really wasn't different for me. Cooka retired from the railroad in 1991 and now trains three days a week, doing speed work one day, hills another; and long runs the third, with two days off before repeating the regimen again. I run 40 to 45 miles a week, he says. "My training schedule enables me to compete in any certain. I also let my body test, so I've never had an injury. Cooka and hii second wife, Melba, live in Payson, Ariz., (pop. 13,620) and have 13 grandchildren, most of them living nearby. Retirement has spawned a pair of diverse secondary careers for Cooka in kndscapiqg and as an oil "!' painter." And of faufte; he'still runs. I was bom a Hopi, and I'll die a Hopi, says Cooka. 1 run ... to honor my Hopi traditions. NTINM Tmya Ltt is afndana urittrfnm Tla&tgff, Ariz. . t t |