Rookie seasons can be tough for athletes. Not only do they have to prove themselves to their coaches, but often they lack the experience and size of the veterans that they play amongst and face. In some sports, freshmen are redshirted — this means they won’t get to play with the team until their second year. Meanwhile, they have to learn the ropes of university athletics.
On the track field, though, Oliver Jorgensen has already met with tremendous success during his freshman year, becoming the first male at SFU to compete at the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championship, and in steeplechase, winning the Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC) title. As a result, he was named the GNAC Freshman of the Year.
To top that off, Jorgensen says that this success came as a surprise to him: “My first year competing was kind of a shock. In high school I was never really front of the pack, kind of always in the middle, not the best.
“I came here and the program just clicked, and with Brit [Townsend] as a coach it all just came together. And then I kept improving and improving, until in outdoor track I won the steeplechase at the GNACs . . . it was kind of like, ‘That actually happened.’”
He explains that qualifying for the championship in the first place came as bit of a surprise. “I honestly didn’t think I was going to make it, it came down to the last minute. I ran a pretty fast time for my first steeplechase early in the season in California and we didn’t think the time would hold. We kept trying to run faster, but I got sick, I hurt my ankle, things just kept adding up and I wasn’t able to get as fast for the rest of the season. Right as they were making the national list, I was in the 20th spot and they took 20.
“It was kind of a shock, and then two people dropped out, so I was 18th, two more people were allowed in, and I was guaranteed a spot. It was pretty crazy, it happened so fast, and next thing I know I’m in Michigan [for the tournament].”
Despite his preference for track and field — a more individual sport than cross country — Olivier puts a lot of emphasis on the value of the team, saying, “It’s mentally straining and it’s physically straining, and sometimes your teammates support you a lot.”
This team dynamic extends beyond the field, as Jorgensen points out that the team motivate each other academically as well.
“[School work] can definitely be hard, especially when you’re away on the weekends. It can be really hard to do work when you’re driving in a bus for nine hours, or flying across the country. It’s hard to do homework, but that’s another team aspect: If someone starts doing homework, everyone starts doing homework.”
He explains further that he lives just off campus with six of his teammates, and the same thing applies at home.
“It’s a messy house,” chuckles Jorgensen. “It’s good because it motivates you to keep [working]. You see them going for a run, you’ve got to go too. Definitely keeps you focused on track, and focused on school, instead of doing other things you probably shouldn’t be doing.”
Despite his quick ascendance on the field, he admits to some difficulty in his first year with a university workload, saying, “It wasn’t so much right away; it was in the second semester [that] it happened to me. The first semester was fine and I kept improving. and then in the second semester my grades started to drop.”
Jorgensen adds, “When things went down for a bit, as I got injured and school got tougher, I realized, not only running-wise, but also academically, this is a lot harder than high school.”
He notes that he is “in-between majors,” stating that he did not like his original area of study, geography, and is contemplating a move into health sciences. This year, he wants to focus more on his academics and raise his grades.
“[I’d like] to be in a spot where I’m not worried about failing a test, where it’s okay if that happens, or not okay, but it wouldn’t be the end of my academics,” Jorgensen says, laughing.
He has also set his eyes on another goal, focused on his team: “My main goal right now is to get the entire cross country team to nationals [. . .] that would be the first time we’ve gotten a [men’s] team to nationals [. . .] that’s a huge accomplishment.”
Right now, he believes the team is on the right track, saying, “[We’re] doing really well right now. We’ve got some great new team members adding to the team. This year is going to be really good for us. I have a feeling we’ll have our highest placing ever in the GNAC.”
