Missouri Valley / St. Louis

Grit & Wit: Sharon Taysi readies to compete in 4th National Senior Games

David Smale | July 02, 2025

Sharon Taysi was chosen for the 2024 USTA St. Louis Mary Vassar Adult Sportsmanship Award.

If you happen to get matched up with Sharon Taysi in a tennis match, you might have more than her backhand or her serve to worry about. You might have to fight off her sense of humor, too.

Taysi, who will be playing in the National Senior Games tennis competition in Des Moines, Iowa later this month, claims she qualifies for the “senior” part of the National Senior Games because she’s “older than Hawaii.” Taysi was born exactly one year before Hawaii gained statehood in August 1958.

That’s just one example of the way Taysi approaches life. She’s a competitive tennis player, certainly, as this year’s National Senior Games will be her fourth time competing at one of the nation’s highest levels of tennis for her age group. She’s also a great sport, as evidenced by her selection for the USTA St. Louis Mary Vassar Adult Sportsmanship Award last year.

Skip Advertisement

The 2025 Games

The National Senior Games comprise Olympic-style multi-sport events held at the local, state and national levels across the U.S., engaging more than 100,000 participants aged 50-plus each year.

The 2025 National Senior Games are set to take place within USTA Missouri Valley in Des Moines on July 24 to Aug. 4.

“Senior Games provide the camaraderie and challenge of competitive sports to older adults, promote health and well-being, and inspire participants to keep moving,” according to the NSGA website.

The reason Taysi plays tennis, in fact, is to keep moving.

“I refuse to go to the dark side and play pickleball,” she said. “I know that people love pickleball, basically because you can pick up a racquet and play pickleball. They say that tennis players do really well at pickleball. But I play tennis to run around the tennis court. In pickleball, you run a little bit.

“But pickleball has a high rate of injury because you have to move so quickly. A lot of people pull something, strain something or fall. I’ll play pickleball if I have to, but I want to play tennis as long as I’m able to run around and hit the ball.”

Sharon Taysi (left) and doubles partner Judy Wagner will compete together at the 2025 National Senior Games in Des Moines, Iowa.

A Winning Combination

Taysi played in the National Senior Games for the first time in 2017. She won the St. Louis region in her age group but still had to qualify at a tournament in Springfield, Illinois to make the National Senior Games.

There, she beat a woman named Judy Wagner on her way to the title. Wagner finished second and they both qualified for the national tournament. They became doubles partners, and they will compete in their fourth Games together this summer.

Taysi finished in sixth place in singles in 2017, losing to the No. 1 seed in the quarterfinals. She beat the No. 4 seed before falling to the No. 2 seed in the fifth-place match.

“I was very proud of myself,” she said. “I got a ribbon.”

The best Taysi and Wagner have done in doubles came in 2019 when they won the consolation round. They had never met before that qualifying tournament in 2017, but they have found that they complement each other’s games.

Taysi, who was rated as a 4.0 player before being slowed by injuries lately—including her second knee replacement in 2022—is fully healthy now. She feels like she is ready to compete for a medal in Des Moines.

Taysi no longer beats Wagner, who is about to improve her ranking to 4.0. Taysi believes Wagner has a chance to win.

More than Medals

Regardless of her final position this year, Taysi recognizes that just making the National Senior Games is quite an accomplishment.

“Just being there is reward enough,” Taysi said. “We know you have to qualify to get there. We have won our share of matches, both of us, so we’ve felt all along that it’s not like we didn’t belong there.”

One of the things Taysi and Wagner enjoy is watching the other competitions. They scout future opponents on the tennis courts, but they also try to watch as many other sports as possible. One year, they were watching the badminton competition and Taysi was recruited to score a match.

Their goal this year in Des Moines is to make the medal rounds in both singles and doubles. Now, you might wonder if Taysi prefers singles or doubles.

“It depends on if I’m winning or not,” she said. “If I’m winning at singles, I love singles. But I especially enjoyed our doubles matches in Albuquerque in 2019 because we were doing so well. In one match, we were down 6-1 and came back to win the pro set, 8-6.

“Each time we’ve competed in the National Senior Games, one or both of us have done pretty well. We were pretty happy with our results.”

Of course they’re happy with the results. Competing at the National Senior Games is no joke.

View additional National Senior Games feature stories from across USTA Missouri Valley by clicking here.

Tournaments
Programs

TOURNAMENTS NEAR YOU

PROGRAMS NEAR YOU