Track Finds Its Stride
With more than 90 athletes, track and field competes against some
of the nation's top schools. Records are falling despite the fact
ECU can't host home events until new facilities are ready.
By Bethany Bradsher
Photography by Jay Clark
n terms of the number of students participating, the second largest sport at ECU after football is track and field, an unusual sport in which some competitors suit up for three distinct seasons and as many as six championships during the year. Historically not among the most successful or most popular sports on campus, the image—and expectations—for track and field are changing. The addition of several new coaches last season already is producing more victories and the construction of a new track and field facility on campus should raise the team’s visibility and help attract better athletes.
Track and field athletes don’t have much of an off-season. “It would be like taking football and saying, we’re going to have a fall football season, and then we’re going to take a little bit of a break and we’re going to have another football season in the winter, and then we’re going to take a little bit of a break and then we’re going to have another football season in the spring,” says head coach Curt Kraft.
And while track and field athletes are members of a team, they contribute to the team’s success with individual skills like triple jumping, sprinting and hammer throwing. Kraft says his challenge is to continue sharpening each athlete’s individual talents while instilling a strong sense of teamwork. “You can’t accomplish what you want to accomplish unless you get across to them that we are a team,” said Kraft, who is entering his second season as head coach for both the men’s and women’s teams. “Even though we are an individual sport, it’s very important that the long jumper goes up to the half miler and says, ‘Hey, good job.’”
“When the distance runners come around and make their laps in practice, you’re hearing the sprinters go, ‘Come on guys, push it, push it,’” says assistant coach Udon Cheek. “That’s never been there before, never.”
East Carolina has produced some notable track and field athletes, including LaShawn Merritt, the 400-meter gold medalist in the 2008 Summer Olympics. There’s also Hector Cotto, a hurdler who competed in those same Olympics for his native Puerto Rico. Both were accomplished athletes, and Merritt’s success was unprecedented in ECU annals, but he spent less than half a year at ECU before signing a professional contract.
Going the distance
The more typical face of ECU track and field belongs to senior Jarrett Newby, an 800-meter specialist who also competes in the mile. He begins each season in August with cross-country team camp in the North Carolina mountains. After a week of running at high elevations, the group is ready for preseason and a slate of meets that runs from early September to early November. Cross-country ends in November, followed by about two weeks of “active recovery.” In early December the indoor season begins, with meets scheduled all the way through early March. Less than two weeks after the indoor track season ends, the outdoor season starts and continues through at least May—and into June for those fortunate enough to qualify for the national meet.
Newby only ran middle distance in high school in Endwell, N.Y., so the transition to competitive cross-country was jolting. “I crashed into that world,” he said. “I didn’t know what I was doing. It’s a five-mile race. That was a death march to me. You can fake an 800 if you’re somewhat in shape and you have guts. You can’t fake five miles.” Newby also represents Conference USA on the NCAA’s national Student-Athlete Advisory Council, and he was one of the inaugural recipients of the C-USA Spirit of Service award in December
Field event athletes like high jumper Valeria Moore don’t compete in the cross-country portion of the season, but the fall conditioning regimen is so intense that Moore can’t find a true off-season in her schedule, either. A junior, Moore was a walk-on member of the team, and last year she tied for second in her event at the C-USA Championship.
“It’s never a dull moment,” Moore said of her training and meet schedule.
Cheek, one of the team’s four paid assistant coaches, can speak with considerable perspective about the changes in the ECU track and field program. When Cheek came to Greenville in 1987 as a sprinter the program was skewed heavily toward speedy, quick events. After several years as a volunteer coach with the women’s program, Cheek was hired to work with the sprinters and relay teams.
Preaching team spirit
The new backdrop for the program probably won’t be measured by spectacular wins, Cheek said, at least not yet. But when Craft took over the program in 2007, he turned his vision of team spirit into action. He assigned jumpers to room with distance runners on the road. He called ahead to restaurants when the team traveled to make sure that all 50-plus athletes who make the trips could eat together.
“He has amazing attention to detail,” Cheek said of Craft. “He remembers kids’ birthdays, their parent’s names, brothers and sisters, conversations he had with them years ago. “That’s what makes it so much a team atmosphere; he’s truly a father figure. He just cares about everybody.”
Assisting the four paid assistant coaches are four volunteers. As program director, Craft is responsible for all travel, meals, equipment, practice schedules, recruiting management and academic accountability. By managing the administrative side of the team, Craft makes it possible for the assistants to focus on their discipline and the athletes in their group.
“I make sure they [student athletes] convey to me what their dreams are,” Cheek said. “Because whatever their dreams, aspirations and goals are, they automatically become mine. That’s the goal of the assistant coach.”
Raising expectations
Because athletes like Newby subject their bodies to practically year-round competition, the coaches must try to improve performance while also preventing injuries. Newby said he was injured much of the time during his first year at ECU, but after that Daniel Lee began coaching the middle and distance runners, including Newby. Now, Newby says he’s rarely injured and he beat his personal-best time in the 800-meters by three seconds.
Brittany Copeland, a sophomore from Stafford, Va., specializes in distance events, and she has also benefited from new coaching in track and field. She came to ECU because “it just seemed to be a growing program,” Copeland said. “We’ve gotten a bunch of new coaches, and just from last year to this year, there’s such a dramatic change in the work ethic,” she added.
Increased fan awareness of the sport undoubtedly will grow once the new track and field facility is completed. Construction was scheduled to start in June. Up to this point, the team has had to do all of their competing on the road.
Senior Kris Bell, who has won the 60-meter hurdles title for two consecutive years at the C-USA Indoor Championships, welcomes the changes. “The more that we compete at a higher level and compete with the best, the more that our program gets recognition,” Bell said. “LaShawn, when he came here and set records, he definitely put us on the map. It’s up to us to step it up and maintain a high level of exposure.”
