He Wants to Run a 100-Meter Dash When He's 100

World champion athletes are rarely wheeled to the starting line before a big race.

But Champion Goldy is not your average track and field star. At 96, he often competes against himself and a time clock because there are increasingly fewer guys in his age group. He has literally outrun most of his competition.

“I can run better than I walk these days,” Goldy said on a recent weekday afternoon. “I fall sometimes because my body gets ahead of my legs.”

But he’s far from feeble. He said his 66-year-old son often wheels him to the starting line for a big race and spectators marvel at how fast he can run. He recently clocked 26 seconds in a 100-meter race.

Goldy won five medals last month in the National Senior Games in Cleveland against actual competition. He walked away with the gold in discus, javelin and shot put and scored a silver in the 50- and 100-meter dash for his age group of men 90-100 years old.

He said he once held a world record for his age group in the shot put, but is still a few years away from his ultimate goal.

“I want to run the 100-meter dash when I’m 100 at the Penn Relays,” Goldy said. “I think I’ll get there.”

Few doubt he will.

Goldy has lived in Haddonfield since 1986 and was a senior pastor at Haddonfield United Methodist Church. The Glassboro native graduated from high school in 1936 and was ordained as a Methodist minister in 1945. He still takes the pulpit a few times a year in a Long Beach Island church in Spray Beach.

His wife, Evelyn, a bit of a spring chicken at 66, says her husband is in better shape than her. She usually stands near the finish line waiting for him. And while she says he’s not quite a blur running by, he is an inspiration to others.

“You gotta keep trying until you're dead,” she joked. “We’ve been together so long I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

Actually, track and field is a bit of a new pursuit for Goldy. He didn’t start competing until he was 70. Some church members convinced him to get involved because he was always in good shape and spirits.

“I said ‘Gosh darn it, I can do this,’” he said. “I started running around neighborhoods to train.”

You can still see him trotting through the streets of Haddonfield training for his next race. And while it’s not quite as triumphant as Rocky bounding up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, it’s not hard to hear the blaring trumpets of the theme song Gonna Fly Now.

And then there’s the name.

“There are five generations of Champion Goldys,” he said. “My son is the fifth. It just happens that my nick name is Champ. It’s fitting with all the medals I’ve won.”