Two area men joined more than 10,000 athletes at the 2009 Senior Summer Games last week at Stanford University. James Kales, 94, and Bruce Ritter, 56, competed in multiple events, both notching top-10 finishes.

Ritter, the boys track coach at Brighton’s Scranton Middle School, ran track for Eastern Michigan University in the 1970s. He competed last week in shot put, triple jump, discus, hammer, high jump, javelin, long jump and bowling, finishing eighth in the hammer and 10th in bowling.

“It’s nice to compete against guys your own age,” said Ritter, who competed in the 55-59 age group. “I still play softball, referee high-school football games, and do the Senior Games - it’s not a full-time job, but just things you enjoy doing on the side.

“It’s good to be competitive and show that you can do things even though gravity wants to pull you down a bit further.”

Senior athletes qualify for the biannual summer games by finishing near the top in annual state events. Kales, a Whitmore Lake resident and a one-time longtime restaurant owner in Ann Arbor, won seven gold medals during the Michigan games, and won silver medals in tennis and the triple jump at the Summer Games, which concluded Aug. 11.

“I committed myself,” Kales said. “I didn’t even think about how old I was.”

Kales said he wants to remain active and compete in the 2011 Summer Games in Houston.

“I can say if I’m alive, I’m gonna be there,” he said. “I’m not gonna quit. This is part of my life now.”