At our pre-season track meeting on Friday, Aarohi Palkar commented that track and field can be a training ground for athletes in other sports. Watching the football playoffs this weekend, I realized that I saw an example of multi-sport athletics–Richard Sherman, cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks.
Sherman is one of the top defensive players in the national football league, and while he was at Stanford he was more than a football star. In the Spring, Sherman did not disappear into the weight room; he was out on the track as a star triple jumper (training with our friend Erica McLain, by the way). In high school, Sherman played football–and also was the California state triple jump champion, and made the state meet in long jump and hurdles. Erica said that he would give his track work a lot of credit for developing the explosiveness that makes him a great defender (and she said Sherman had plenty of time to lift in the weight room and also get out and work on his speed and explosiveness on the track).
Football has many other examples of stars who doubled in track–a classic combination is the lineman or linebacker who also throws the shot put and discus. A famous example from the past is Jonathan Ogden, a hall of fame lineman who also was an all-american thrower for UCLA. Ogden took a break from football and worked on his throwing, and excelled at both.
I’m thinking about football this morning, however there are many other examples of other sports too…going far back in history, Wilt Chamberlin was one of the greatest basketball players of all time, and also a world-class high jumper. Great old photos, right?
OK so these are the pros–what about the other sports, and what about high school athletes? There are lots of athletes in ‘non-major’ at many schools who compete in track in addition to their primary sports, and go on to big success. I remember one of my coaching friends mentioning one of the girls on her team at one of the invitationals we went to in 2013, that she was a multi-sport athlete, so I looked it up and and sure enough — Kristina Bassi, who high jumped and triple jumped for St. Francis two years ago, is now playing for the Stanford field hockey team.
We can go on and on…Shalane Flanagan was a high school soccer player who started to run distances to be in better shape for soccer (and ended up as an Olympian on the track), Stephanie Brown who went to Cal Poly on a basketball scholarship (but threw the discus to make Spring time weight lifting more interesting and useful, and ended up throwing in Beijing), and on and on. Recently at Monta Vista, Richelle Ju had been a basketball player, joined the track team and became an all-league high jumper, and she was recruited and is now jumping for Smith College. Does anyone else have any more examples?
So…whether your first athletic passion is for football, basketball, soccer, field hockey, volleyball or anything else, why not take a spring season and instead of doing the same old thing in the weight room or on your usual field, come give track and field a try? Track will welcome anyone who wants to work hard and put their heart into being the best you can be for three months. You will return to your home sport fitter and maybe faster and stronger and able to jump higher and farther.
The Monta Vista team has some great coaches–Andy Arness, who is our throw coach (and I believe is the best high school throwing coach within 100 miles), is also a USA weight lifting certified coach and can help power athletes become stronger and more importantly explosive. Our jump coaches, David Pride and Scott and Rick Blomquist can help you be more supple and explosive and come back to your home sport going higher and further. Ray Cornell, one of the best hurdle coaches in the section, will help you learn how to hurdle–and that means you are developing more coordination, flexibility, strength, speed, and yes, explosiveness to bring back to your other sports (RG3 was the second fastest high school hurdler in US history).
Who knows, you might come back and find out you made a big improvement over the people in your ‘regular’ sport who did the same old thing this Spring–and you will have more fun doing and learning something new!
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A schedule, date of the first practice and other information is available here. Remember to get all your paperwork ready for the first day of practice, including support for the Monta Vista Athletic Boosters; all the forms are available here. Don’t forget to have your physical done right away. If you have already been involved in an MV sport you can get most of your paperwork from our trainer, Marie–except you will need a new Boosters membership for each sport and season.
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Josh Cox read this article and had some additions:
Bob Hayes, pro football hall of fame receiver and also a 100m gold medal winner in the 1964 Olympics.
Bo Jackson, pro football and baseball player, also won high school state titles in hurdles, the high jump, and the long jump.