Alaska’s Ron Mohr earns place in bowling Hall of Fame

If your image of a bowler is that of a chain-smoking, beer-swilling, pot-bellied figure, Alaska's latest Hall of Fame bowler will blow away that stereotype.

On Wednesday, the day the Professional Bowlers Association announced that Ron Mohr had been voted into the PBA Hall of Fame, Mohr did what he always does on Wednesdays:

550 situps and 180 pushups.

Mohr, 61, said a long pursuit of fitness helped give him an edge when he joined the PBA in 2008.

In the 10 years since, he has racked up enough accolades and achievements to merit his Hall of Fame selection: nine senior-level PBA tournament victories, two Player of the Year awards on the senior tour for players 50 and older (2009, 2011), two Player of the Year awards on the super-senior tour for players 60 and older (2016, 2017) and prize winnings totaling more than $300,000.

He'll be inducted into the Hall of Fame in a February ceremony in Indianapolis, along with Chris Barnes, an 18-time PBA champion from Double Oak, Texas, and the late Don Mitchell, who ran a bowling center and hosted a PBA tournament in Indianapolis.

"How incredible is that?" Mohr said by phone Wednesday from Las Vegas, where he now lives with his wife, Lita.

"I still don't picture myself on par with the greats of the game, the ones we grew up watching play on TV all the time and many of those we routinely knock heads with now," he said. "I've had some success and I know that I can be pretty competitive at times. When I'm on, I'm one of the best out there. But to get this far and have a jury of your peers deem you worthy of this honor? Yeah, I am surprised."

Long one of Alaska's top bowlers — he worked at Center Bowl for a time — Mohr gave professional bowling a shot in 2008 after he retired from his job as an air traffic controller. He cashed in at his first two PBA senior tournaments, and a new career was launched.

Mohr lived in Alaska from 1979 to 2013, before moving from Eagle River to Las Vegas to be closer to pro tournaments. He and his wife, Lita, still have family here.

"My game without a doubt evolved to the world-class competitive level during my stay in Alaska," Mohr said. "I credit that to all the guys I got to bowl against there and to the Clapper family that let me bowl a lot when I was working at Center Bowl."

While working as an air traffic controller, Mohr began a fitness regimen to keep in shape. He started keeping track of his workouts in 1999, and since then he has logged some impressive numbers — 2.08 million situps and 1.02 million pushups. He does pushups every day, situps Monday, Wednesdays and Fridays and runs on a treadmill for 45 minutes the other four days of the week.

He said he started the routine for its health benefits. But he thinks it has made him a better bowler too.

"It's become almost as mental as anything," he said. "I know easily 90 percent of the players don't do that on the senior tour. They are dedicated to the game, but I'm not sure if they are dedicated to the fitness.

"I think it gives me an edge both mentally and physically."

In July, Mohr won his ninth PBA50 tournament and his first in five years, but his biggest achievement of the most recent season came in August at the World Senior Tournament in Munich, Germany.

There, he won four medals — golds in singles, team doubles and all-events and a silver in doubles. It was his third time at the every-other-year event, and this year's haul gives Mohr a tournament-record six gold medals.

Mohr is Alaska's second PBA Hall of Famer. In 1994, Brian Voss of Anchorage — the winner of 25 PBA titles and the 1988 PBA Player of the Years — was inducted in 1994.

A third Alaska, Dimond High graduate Sean Rash, is on track to join Voss and Mohr in the Hall of Fame. The winner of 12 PBA titles and the 2011-12 Player of the year, Rash becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame in 2025, according to a PBA spokesman.

This story has been edited to include Brian Voss' membership in the PBA Hall of Fame.