|
Nick Landers Rewrites the Record Book
by Christopher Hewitt
Landers up to speed
|
Runners to your mark! Set! Bang! The gun goes off, leaving smoke floating in the air. Forty-nine seconds goes by. Nick Landers is done with his race, leaving everyone else several meters behind.
If you have ever been to a track meet or talked to a runner, you know that track is a very demanding sport.
The 400-meter race is a full sprint around the track. It is a nightmare to many sprinters. Nick Landers is a member of the Mars Hill College Track team and just might be the fastest person on the team.
Nick just grins and says, "that means nothing to me. There is someone out there who is better."
Nick is an all around athlete and scholar. He is a member of the Grayson Scholars. He currently holds five Mars Hills Records in the 400-meter indoor, Indoor 4x400, Outdoor 4x400, Outdoor 4x200 and the (D.M.R). Distance Medley Race.
Nick started running track in the tenth grade after his basketball coach said he looked pretty fast, so he looked into it. Yet he was a star on the basketball court before he traded his ball in for a pair of spikes.
"My first passion was basketball. I played ball because it was fun. I liked winning, and I was very successful at ball. I stop playing basketball because it wasn't fun anymore. The coach would focus more on the individual success than the team. I went from a team-oriented program to a team where certain individual stats were more important than winning games."
Nick was born in San Diego California. His parents were in the military, so he moved to many different locations -- Virginia, Florida, and he now lives in Georgia.
He went to high school at Monroe Area High. Reflecting on the years there, he says, "It was crazy. There were good faculty members and bad ones. The school was falling apart. I had 400 students in my freshman class. Of the 400, 160 graduated. Many of the others were lost to the streets; others were trapped with babies. In Monroe, if people see you doing something to get out of the town, they try and trap you.
"I was a little unpopular at first - in ninth and tenth grades. I joined groups like F.B.L.A. -- Future Business Leaders of America -- played ball and ran track. Women love success, so I became successful."
He played the alto saxophone in the band all four years in high school. He does not play anymore. It's something that he grew out of when he entered college.
"I still work with music now. I produce R&B beats for my CD. My goal is to get rich and use it as an outlet for my voice. The name of my CD will be Truth is Life or D.A.B.A. the stages of Psychology.
"I love track. My first race was the 800-meter, which is two laps around the track. My coach placed me in every race until I found the 400 was my best fit."
He started out running the 400-meter in 59 seconds. By the end of the season he was running 53. He was placed on a 4x4 A team by the end of his eleventh grade year. At the age of 16 he was beating runners who were two years older.
"It was a great feeling. I would go to a race, and the guys running next to me would say, 'Nick's here!' I was shooting for second place. Senior year was great. I raced the number one man in the nation in the 400 -- Justin Oliver. I lost, but I raced him."
Twelfth grade was a great season. Nick lost only three times. His worst finish was third. Leaving high school he was running 49.2 in the open 400. Nick had full scholarships to go colleges like Savannah State, Florida Memorial, Fort Valley, etc.
"Coming to Mars Hill College," he says, "I was expecting to lower my time to compete at the national level. My high school Coach Tim Kemp told Coach Owens that 'to get Nick at Mars Hill is a steal.'
"I liked Mars Hill because of the religious affiliation. I thought it would change my negative behaviors in a more positive direction. Plus I liked the location of the school in the mountains."
He thinks the training that the sprinters get here is suited more for distance runners. "Some training methods are ineffective and in fact detrimental to our health physically."
Nick would like to see more effective communication between athletes and the coaches as far as workouts are concerned. He says the program cannot reach ultimate success without better a track to train on.
Nick is recovering from a pulled hamstring that kept him out for a month. "My body hurts and I am frustrated with the lack of consideration for the track athletes," he says. "I hope that the situation will change in the years to come."
Give us your feedback. We value your opinions.
The Hilltop reserves the right not to post anonymous comments or any that could be judged slanderous, that make unverifiable allegations of fact, or use language we consider in bad taste.
All fields must be filled in.
HOME
| 
