Inside the life of a student-athlete

I never needed sports to motivate me in school.

I never needed soccer, volleyball, cross-country, track and field or Nordic skiing to give me a reason to keep my grades up. But when I entered high school, sports became an enormous part of my life. Not just because it consumed my time — which would, hypothetically, otherwise be used for homework or socializing — but because it filled the time I didn’t know I had with fulfilling friendships and competition.

I imagine our local high school student-athletes have come to similar conclusions. This is why we at the Frontiersman are hosting the annual Student-Athlete of the Year banquet and awards ceremony this Thursday, starting at 6:30 p.m. at Evangelo’s in Wasilla. This year, each winner will receive a $1,000 scholarship toward his or her post-secondary education.

But there are some things you need to know about student-athletes, beyond their grade point average and performance on the court, field, trail, etc.

First, the friendships we make are different. I made many — some lasting, some fleeting; some formed and some fostered on long bus trips with school sports teams. I became friends with other students who, until we became teammates, would never have crossed my path. And eventually, some of my older sister’s friends became my friends, too.

But as a three-year captain of the Colony High School ski team, I found that some of my friends were more willing to be such when I was “on their side.”

When you’re thrust into a leadership position — even if you chose it or earned it — you set yourself apart from the rest of the group. For better or worse, you become the link between the laymen and the judge — your teammates, and your coaches. You’re obligated to approach your coaches on behalf of your teammates, and your teammates on behalf of your coaches. And sometimes, what the masses want is either a) incongruous with “what’s best” for them, b) incongruous with what the coaches want, or c) a combination of both.

For example, on a long, say, two-hour ski out Archangel Road in Hatcher Pass, it’s easy for casual skiers to stop and chat or ski-walk when the coaches aren’t around. If it was the group I was skiing with, sometimes I’d push them, sometimes I’d leave them and sometimes, I’ll admit, I gave in.

You could say I let them have their way in order to keep spirits high, thereby increasing our willingness to perform well to support our teammates. Maybe that was true. Maybe I grew tired of being set apart. But I made a reasoned decision in each situation.

I think that’s what people want of leaders — to make reasoned decisions, even if they turn out to be the wrong ones. Of course, no one wants a person in charge who consistently makes wrong decisions. But one wrong choice usually isn’t enough to undermine a leader.

However, there is an area in which leaders can be offered little forgiveness without a correction of behavior. It’s called hazing.

Shortly after I arrived at college, in August 2010 — early, for the start of the cross-country running season — our captains organized a years-old tradition called “The Hat Game.” The set-up was simple: take a few hours to come up with a question of some kind, then throw it in the hat as it goes around the circle of teammates. Each teammate draws a question, and answers it.

Harmless, right?

Although the questions vary from year to year, more than half are always sexual in nature, and several singled out individual athletes during my collegiate running career. My junior year, one or two of my freshman teammates got a pass because they were so uncomfortable. But that didn’t always happen. I saw young person after young person get berated by their friends until they came up with an answer other than “I don’t know.”

For most of the older athletes, I know it was out of a sense of justice that they dragged answers out of the underclassmen — they had answered the questions in their time, and it was only fair if the future generations of runners were put on the spot. But of course, that’s the kind of “justice” that perpetuates the never-ending cycle of abuse.

Yes, I’m calling it abuse. I loved running in college. I loved my teammates. But I don’t think we had to hurt each other to be closer.

Where that idea comes from, I’m not entirely sure, but sports teams all over the country, at every level, seem to have adopted it. We think that if we survive something dark, secret and painful together, no one will know us as well as our teammates do.

Maybe that’s true. But why force it? And if we’re going to talk pain, why isn’t the physical pain of running as hard as possible enough to bring people together?

In all honesty, the “initiation” sequences I heard about from sororities and fraternities sounded much worse — and were received more poorly by the rest of the student body — but the concept is the same. Hazing/harming/harassing is not an acceptable way of forming trust.

School sports are, or at least should be, about athletic performance and staying or becoming healthy — physically, mentally, emotionally. That’s why we want to single out the athletes who get that, the student-athletes who find ways to make time for sports practices and schoolwork, only to find they have even more time for other activities.

They don’t just get their work done to maintain a good-looking GPA and stay on the field or trail or track or in the pool. They do it because success feels good.

Ideally, athletes train to be the fastest, strongest and most skilled they can be, without crossing that literal breaking point. As you become a better athlete, your body should feel better. Your stress level should be lower, to allow time and focus for other pursuits (like school). You should be happy with your performance, and always looking for ways to improve. That impresses people, and rightly so.

So to all our Student-Athlete of the Year nominees, we hope you know what leaders you are. We hope you wield that leadership responsibly. And we hope all student-athletes — and coaches — get on board with initiatives like Wasilla High School teacher and soccer coach Blake Livingston’s “Warrior Athletes for Positive Change,” which teaches that athletes are role models held to a higher standard.

We are held to higher standards because we set higher standards for ourselves. We want to be more, do more.

This the life of a student athlete.