#31 - Kids in the Hall & the Reluctant Olympic Champion

In This Issue

• A Sponsor? Cool!

• Kids in the Hall

• This Week in Track

• The Olympic champion who wasn’t into sports

• College Signings

• Little Things

Welcome to Ann Arbor Running Company!

Welcome to Ann Arbor Running Company as the first sponsor of the Michtrack Newsletter. This kind of mutual community support goes a long way and we are very appreciative.

Last year this little newsletter had over 78,000 impressions according to our hosts at Beehiiv. There’s room for more sponsorship, and our readership includes the most die-hard track & XC fans in the state, so if your company or organization is interested in partnering with us, please contact [email protected].

Remember Kids in the Hall?

I don’t mean the show, although that was pretty good in its first incarnation circa 1988. I mean I’m wondering if you shared those moments in high school that I experienced, thinking I was a pretty decent runner, but knowing that there were probably guys in my school who could beat me if they trained half as hard as me. People called me lots of things, but never “talented.”

This became a lunch table discussion topic with my friends, and the theme became: how many potential sub-4:00 milers are walking in the hallways of this school? Note we were talking about physical potential only—motivation, interest, work ethic, all that stuff didn’t matter. We looked at people: those stars in other sports, those people not interested in sports, everyone. Usually we came up with a number of somewhere between 5 and 10. Definitely Gary Wilkie, our buddy who ran a 1:57.9 half mile on virtually no training.

This conversation came back to me as I was putting together the story of Olympic champion William Porter (below). Porter had no interest in sports and would have never tried running if not for transferring to a school that required sports participation. If he had stayed at Jackson High, he never would have been Olympic champion. That’s no knock on Jackson. This kid wasn’t going to run anywhere unless someone forced him to.

Check out this photo:

Student council, 1941, Jackson High. Porter is first row, third from the left. I’ve highlighted him. He’s a 9th-grader and the only person in the photo who is slouching. He also has an unmistakable smirk on his face. My guess is that if you were looking at the kids in Jackson High School’s hallways that spring and were trying to pick out potential Olympic champions, there are 25 guys in that photo alone you would have picked before him. (I’m not even counting the girls, who back in those days had minimal athletic opportunity).

I hate to get preachy but I think there’s a lesson here—Coaches, don’t fall for the fallacy that you have an unerring eye for who has potential and who doesn’t. Give everyone a chance, give them encouragement, and you might be surprised.

This Week In Track

Aquinas MITS (12/16): DeWitt’s Drew Novak took the 60 in 7.06… Evan Walker of Waverly ran a nice small track 22.89 for 200… Rockford’s Greta Caprathe-Buczek doubled with jumps of 5-3 NS 17-5.25.

Grand Valley MITS (12/16): Jake Machiniak of Berrien Springs sprinter 7.03… Sophomore Ty Oaks of Portage Northern ran 400 in 49.60… Liam Hinman of Forest Hills Eastern clocked a nice 1:57.49 for 800… Adam Cahoon (Okemos) vaulter 14-0… Lawton’s Mason Mayne took over the shot lead at 55-5.25… Liam Takace of Portage Central threw the weighty 59-8… Shore TC (all the same school?) relayed 3:32.85… Valerie Beeck of Grand Haven won the 800 in 2:17.92… Shepherd’s Kendall Wilcox high jumped an impressive 5-5.

Ypsilanti Lincoln MITS (12/16): This biggest numbers this week came from the LAB. In the 60, Hartland’s Cameron Cheetam flew to a 6.98… Shamar Heard of Chippewa Valley burned a 21.92 for 200, with Cheetam at 22.30… Will Jaiden Smith of Belleville hit 49.58 for the 400 ahead of Detroit Edison’s Geoffrey McBurrows (49.71)… Pierce Gryzmkowski of Lakeland ran 800 in 1:59.00… Belleville’s Schmar Gamble burned a state-leading 8.06 in the hurdles; that’s just 0.02 away from Drake Johnson’s sophomore state record… Almont’s Chase Battani cleared 15-0 in the vault… Charlie Garner of Lincoln improved to 22-5 in the long jump… Camden Pawlick of Saline took the discus in 144-10… Motor City ran a state-leading 3:32.31 in the 4×4.

On the girls side, Taryn Henderson took over the state 60 lead with her 7.68, and also won the 200 in 25.24… Nevaeh Burns of Oak Park ripped a 56.43 for 400 to top Belleville’s Jada Wilson (56.94)… Oak Park’s Kylee King took over the 800 list with her 2:16.15… The hurdles got real fast, with Oak Park’s Morgan Roundtree (8.85) and Carrie VanNoy (8.91) breaking 9, with Cass Tech’s Lindsay Johnson at 9.06… Mercy’s Milena Chevallier cleared a list-leading 5-6 in the high jump… Addyson Stiverson of Montrose added nearly two feet to the state 9th grade record in the shot with her 43-5.5… That 179-6 winning mark in the girls discus? That’s real. Sadly, Julia Tunks is not a Michigander. The Canadian last year won the Pan-Am U20 gold medal… In relay action, Track Life ripped 1:42.61 in the 4×2, and Motor City 4:01.61 in the 4×4.

Updated 2023-24 Indoor Boys Lists

Updated 2023-24 Indoor Girls Lists

And before anyone goes off on us: No, the kids don’t represent their schools during the MITS season. Yes, we list them by their schools because the club scene is a confusing mishmash that means little to the fans. School affiliations help us all contextually. In this we follow the policy of Track & Field News, as we have for decades.

Legend: William Porter - Jackson’s Reluctant Olympic Champion

In 1941, Jackson High had a pretty decent track program. Under coach Fred Janke (no relation to later Viking coach Charlie Janke), the Vikings finished 3^rd in the old 5-A League, and they had a state mile champion in Jay Woolsey (father to current Lumen Christi head Mike).

If Janke had a good eye for recruiting talent in the halls, would he have even noticed William Porter? He did no sports, and he didn’t cut an athletic figure (later on, puberty sent his height skyrocketing to 6-3). The only picture we have of Porter from those days is of a small fellow slumped in his chair during a student council photo.

After his sophomore year at Jackson, Porter’s parents (his dad was a doctor) decided to send him to an exclusive East Coast prep school, the Hill School in Pottsdown, Pennsylvania. There he had to finally try a sport, as the school rules required it. First he tried baseball, but he got cut. So he had to join the track team. He showed up in the newspapers for the first time with a 1943 dual meet win in the 220-yard low hurdles in 26.8.

His senior year he found some success, winning the 60-yard dash at the AAU Interscholastic Championships (yes, there was a high school indoor nationals back then) in 6.4, 2^nd in the high hurdles, and 4^th in the long jump with a 19-4.75 effort. He was voted the best athlete of the meet and given a watch.

Porter opted to head back home for college and started out at Western Michigan. As a freshman in 1945, he immediately became a winner for the Broncos, taking three events in an indoor contest against Notre Dame. Outdoors he again hit the Irish hard, winning the 100 yards in 9.9, the highs in 15.5 and the 220 lows in 25.0. At the NCAA Championships, he placed 3^rd in the high hurdles and 5^th in the lows.

Despite his success in Kalamazoo, Porter transferred to Northwestern for the rest of his college career. At the next Big 10 meet, he placed 2^nd in the lows and 3^rd in the highs.

In 1947, he placed 2^nd to Harrison Dillard at the NCAA meet in both the highs and the lows (22.5). At the end of the year, a new publication called Track & Field News put out its first set of World Rankings, and named Porter No. 2 in his event.

1948 saw Porter 2^nd in the NCAA’s again, this time to Arkansas’s Clyde Scott in a windy 13.8. Then in July, Porter finally won his first major race, hurdling 14.1 to take the AAU title in an upset victory over Dillard, the World Record holder who had won 82 straight races. In the Olympic Trials the following week, the heavily-favored Dillard slammed into the second and fourth hurdles hard and stopped at the seventh barrier. That left Porter to streak to the win by two yards in 13.9.

From a newspaper report of the time: “Porter, the six-foot three-inch, 150-pound son of a Jackson, Mich., physician, comes closest to being the exception proving the rule [that a great hurdler must be a solid sprinter]. At Hill School, he was too slow for sprinting [the author didn’t notice that he was a national 60 champ in high school].

“Young Porter gives veteran coach Frank Hill of Northwestern full credit for developing him into an Olympic winner. Hill saw that Porter would have to make up in form for whatever speed he lacked, so turned him into a picture hurdler. He placed frames on top of hurdles, and made the former Navy ensign jump through them without scraping his shins or bumping his head.”

“The result was a diving technique, with both hands extended as he sailed over a barrier. The average hurdler extends only the left hand.”

Prior to his two victories over Dillard, Porter had lost to him in all 11 of their races. Dillard, meanwhile, crafted his own legend, placing 3^rd in the Trials 100 and then becoming the surprise gold medalist in the sprint. Four years later he would finally win Olympic hurdle gold.

At the London Olympics, Porter won his semi by equaling the Olympic record of 14.1. Then he took sole ownership of the record with his 13.9 win in the final, leading a sweep for Team USA in front of 75,000 fans in Wembley Stadium.

Porter told Track & Field News, “I got off fast and I thought I had the race won. Then I hit the third hurdle and by the time we reached the sixth hurdle I was two yards behind Craig [Dixon]. Right then I thought he had me beat, but he made a mistake over the eighth hurdle and I had him for keeps. Record or not, it was a sloppily-run race. I’m surprised it was that fast. My 14.1 semi-final somehow felt faster.”

Said Dixon, who finished 3rd, “in the middle of the race, I was leading. I was feeling good and thought I had the race won. That was my big mistake. At the last hurdle I was a little high, and I just wasn’t driving to the tape, and he passed me. It was the first photo finish of the Olympic Games.”

Shortly after the Games, Porter won the hurdles in 14.0 in a dual meet between the United States and the British Empire. That was the last race of his career. At the age of 22, he retired from sports, telling reporters, “I have a wife and no job.”

September 16, 1948 was declared Bill Porter Day in Jackson, and both the champion and coach Hill came to town to address his fans.

Porter went on to a career in the hospital supply business. He died in California on March 10, 2000, at age 73.

Stat Attack: Pole Vault

Every time a state record falls, I like to update my notes on the progression of the state record, that is, the chronological accounting of every person who has ever had that record from day 1. Inevitably, such a list is a research challenge, and there almost always are early days where we’re not sure what was happening. The girls pole vault is the exception. We knew when it was going to happen, and we were there, recording the exact order of the athletes to make sure we knew who held the state record when. So here it is, from the 6-foot vault of Rhianna Evans to the 13-7 of Brooke Bowers!

College Signings

Another installment of this feature. If you’re not sure if I reported your person, you can find back issues here. We have published these in issues 28, 29 & 30. If you know of any current HS seniors who are planning to compete at the college level and haven’t been reported here, please email [email protected].

• Madalyn Agren (Johannesburg-Lewiston) - Oakland

• Meghan Ford (Mason) - Michigan State

• Eleanor Kingshott (Western Michigan Christian) - Cornerstone

• Liliana Lehnst (Ithaca) - Saginaw Valley

• Peyton Spicer (Owosso) - Central Michigan

• Anthony Urbaniak (Stockwell Academy) - Cornerstone

And a rare early commitment from a current junior: Hart’s state champion Jessie Jazwinski has given a verbal yes to NC State, the current NCAA champions in D1 XC.

Also, Northern Michigan’s Emma Moore will be transferring to Cornerstone.

Little Things

Seamus Noonan: The Grand Haven runner, an alum of Chariots of Fire and the GRTC Peregrines, has announced that he has to take a medical retirement from running collegiately for Grand Valley. “Five years ago, doctors told me I would never run again, but I proved them wrong. Unfortunately, this time I must acknowledge their expertise.”

Kristina Olsen has been hired to fill the big shoes of Lisa Last as Traverse City Central’s girls XC coach. Olsen has been assistant there for 7 years and did her competitive running at Jackson High and Alabama-Birmingham.

There’s still time for end-of-year tax-deductible donations to our nonprofit, dedicated to promoting our sport and its history. Here’s where you go.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to All! Not sure whether there will be a newsletter next week. At this point, not sure what my week will look like, so if this is the last of the year, may we wish you a Happy New Year!