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Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2008

Stephanie Brown Trafton throws for gold at Beijing Olympics

Cal Poly and Arroyo Grande High alumna Stephanie Brown Trafton’s 212-foot discus toss lands her on the medal stand and boosts the struggling U.S. track and field team

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Arroyo Grande High School is going to raise another banner for Stephanie Brown Trafton this year. But it won’t be for appearing in the Olympics, like the last one.

Brown Trafton, 28, a graduate of Arroyo Grande High School and Cal Poly, became the first woman from the United States to win the gold medal in the Olympic discus throw event since 1932.

With the rest of her team in a slump, Brown Trafton provided a much needed — and surprising — victory Monday at the National Stadium, nicknamed the Bird’s Nest, in Beijing.

“I came to the Bird’s Nest to lay a golden egg,” she told reporters afterward. “And that’s what I did.”

While Brown Trafton competed during the 2004 Olympics in Athens, she easily outdid herself this time.

Her first throw traveled 212 feet, 5 inches — nearly four feet further than the second-place finisher, Yarelys Barrios of Cuba.

Brown Trafton deliberately set out to surpass her 2004 Olympic performance in Athens, said Tony Mikla, her personal trainer in the Sacramento area, where she now lives. But a gold medal was seen as an outside shot.

“Her goal was to medal,” Mikla said. “But it was one of those goals set with a smirk on your face. Like, ‘Who wouldn’t?’ ”

In Athens, she finished 11th. Brown Trafton, whose Olympic diaries have been published in The Tribune, was unavailable for comment from China.

But in an interview with The Tribune earlier this summer, Brown Trafton expressed confidence that she could do better in China.

“This time it feels like I can actually make an impact at the world level,” she said. “Whereas before I was happy to go and happy with the experience … I’ve definitely got a mission that I’ve got to accomplish.”

By Monday morning, word of her victory had already spread to Arroyo Grande High School, where the faculty is preparing to welcome back students in one week.

While the high school has had many state champs, none have achieved as much as Brown Trafton.

“She was the first Olympian from our school four years ago,” said James Brown, the head track coach since 1995.

While she attended Arroyo Grande High, he added, Brown Trafton would often be seen working out in the weight room, where a photo of her now hangs for inspiration.

“That was important for her track development,” he said.

At Arroyo Grande High, she won three state titles in track. And she was a basketball star.

The 6-foot-4 athlete had the height for basketball, which helped her garner a scholarship to Cal Poly. An injury in that sport, though, forced Brown Trafton to focus on track and field.

There she had potential, said her former coach, Pete Corkery. But she needed work.

“The challenge was always to get her motivated and to push her,” he said.

At Cal Poly, where she studied industrial engineering, she won six all-American awards.

In 2004, Corkery echoed, the big challenge for Brown Trafton was to make the Olympics.

“In ’04, she raised herself far beyond where she’d ever been before to make the team and that was a surprise,” he said. “This time I knew the trials were just a stepping stone for her.”

Jerry Trafton, her husband, got up early, arriving at his office at 3:15 a. m. to begin monitoring the discus competition on his computer.

He then spoke to his wife by phone.

“She was ecstatic,” he said. “I knew she had a real good shot at it.”

Brown Trafton’s father, Steve Brown, spent the morning rejoicing at his West Sacramento residence.

“I’m very proud of her,” Brown said. “I’ve thought for awhile she had a chance to do gold. It all comes down to the moment.

“We knew she had that potential since she was small.”

To get to the next level, she contacted Mikla, a physical therapist and sports performance coach, who had worked with players from the NBA and Major League Baseball.

“You knew she had it in her,”Mikla said. “We were trying to get her to peak at the right time.”

By timing her exercise schedule, Mikla said, Brown Trafton could gain strength and not be too tired when it came time to compete.

Because she is tall, she had problems with her footing. So they also worked on balance and body awareness.

When she started working with Mikla, Brown Trafton was ranked 35th. The next year, she was 28th. And before this year’s Olympics, she was ranked third.

While she had a breakout season qualifying—she had the world-leading mark in May—she was still an underdog heading to Beijing.

“The women throwers always took a back seat internationally,” Corkery said.

Now that she has won the sport’s ultimate prize — the gold—the question remains whether Brown Trafton will try again in four years.

For someone who does well going in as the underdog, it’d be interesting, Corkery said, to see Brown Trafton compete as a favorite.

“It’s a lot easier for the underdog, mentally,” he said. “In sports, I think it’s one of the toughest things to be the best and to stay the best.”

Regardless, she’s made her mark at Arroyo Grande High, where athletic director Jim Fogarty said a new gold medal banner would soon mark her achievement at the school gym.

“She was always humble, always helpful — just a nice kid,” he said. “When you work with athletes and you’re around them, there are the ones who have the big heads and there are the ones who are nice people. And she was one of those nice people.”

John Schumacher of The Sacramento Bee contributed to this report.