Leroy Burrell Chat Wrap

Dec. 19, 2001

Moderator: Good afternoon, everyone.
We are fortunate to have with us UH head track and field coach Leroy Burrell today. Coach Burrell will be available to answer your questions today, so let's begin.

Greg (Houston): Do you feel that Houston has lost its spot atop the C-USA perch in recent years due to increased competition or the lack of quality recruits wanting to attend U of H following in such great footsteps as yours, Carl Lewis', and Joe DeLoach?

Leroy Burrell: When you talk about athletes like Carl and Joe and myself, you are talking about some of the best athletes in the world. To expect to have athletes of that caliber is a bit unrealistic. We produced some athletes that some countries would envy. We are trying to develop athletes to compete on the highest level of competition that they can compete at. We go after the best athletes available. Last year, we had Jenny Adams in our program. She went on to win the USA national championship in the long jump and placed in the hurdles and placed fourth in the World Championships. That's a world-class athlete who came out of our program. I suspect that we will produce one or two athletes every two or three years that can compete on that level.

Braylon-Houston: what is the status of the jc sprinter mike mithcell and besides the four people listed during the early signing period.are we in on any more top recruits.

Leroy Burrell: At this point, Mike is not eligible. The NCAA does not allow me to speak on a recruit on an indvidual basis. We recruit in an ongoing manner. We still have some scholarships available, primarily on the men's side, so we will go get the best athletes that we can.

Brian(Tampa): Mr.Burell I see you have expand you coaching horizons to more than just your college team with some outside additions.How is the new addition of Danny McCray working?

God Bless, Brian

Leroy Burrell: Danny is doing very well. As a matter of fact, he told me today that he was going to make him famous, but I told him I was already pretty famous. Having Danny out here and having the kids see him finish his workouts before they come out, it helps us. We had a really strong development link between the young kids, the old kids and the post collegiate kids in our program. We lost that. Having elite athletes train on your track and having the kids see that inspires them. We have a good training environment. We hope that we can develop kids in our program, have them compete at high levels and continue that development chain.

Brian Los Gatos CA: Who do you think has a chance at becoming an All-American?

Leroy Burrell: Starting with the men, I am excited about Robert Foster. He is developed to the point where he can bring us back to our sprint heritage.
Greg Christie had an excellent fall and we are expecting some exciting things from him.
One freshman that we are really excited about is Milton Manson. He has all the tools and body type to be an outstanding 110-meter hurdler.
On the women's side, Rhian Clarke is already a three-time All-America. We are excited about our two throwers, Tinisha Wesley and Allie Booker. We think we can develop them to All-American levels. We were fortuante to get a transfer from Arizona State, Courtnie Ratliff.
We think that Alicia Cave and Lauren Smith will be a good 1-2 punch in the hurdles.

Brian Los Gatos CA: How many scholarships will UH have to give this Spring?

Leroy Burrell: It's a difficult question. Track and field can give partial scholarships. We have scholarship money available. It depends how we decide to use that money. We may decide to give a full scholarship to one young lady and one or two men. It all depends on what we are looking for but we do have scholarship money available, more on the men's side than the women.

DeWayne(St.Louis): Leroy I'm a will big sports fan, and I always wanted to know how do trak and field coaches recruit?

Leroy Burrell: We recruit just like all the sports. We go out and take a look at the kids and do home visits. We scout meets and do official visits. We follow up with letters. Oddly enough, it is more competitive to get the best track athletes in the country because there are only about 10 athletes who can come in and help you immediately. It's a lot of work but we go out and do the best we can. If we can get a few athletes out of Houston and then maintain our contact on the east and west coasts, then we will always have a good pipeline of athletes.

Pat Fiorill, Springfield: Leroy, you are a great role model to myself and to my team. I coach high school tack in Missouri and would love to know the best advice you ever gave and the best you ever received. Thank you very much.

Leroy Burrell: The best advice that I ever gave and continue to give is to measure your success on an individual basis. A lot of athletes think they are supposed to run a certain time or win a certain meet and if that doesn't happen, they are unsuccessful. If you know that you compete to the best of your ability, prepared yourself to compete and yet didn't attain a goal, then you have to consider that successful, no matter whether you won or lost.
The best advice that I received was to learn how to focus on what I am trying to accomplish. I was easily distracted at times when I was competing, so I needed to learn to focus on me and not the competition or the size of the meet.

Jim in Houston: What camps or training aids do you recommend for a 13yr old person looking to develope greater speed and burst speed? This person is very quick and unbeatable in first 15 meters but needs to learn proper techniques for sprinting before they can increase their speed, tus lowering their time in a 50 meter race.

Leory Burrell: First, start with coming to our camp. We have a track camp every June and would be glad to work with you. Look on the web site in the Track and Field section under Camps and make plans to visit us. We would love to see you out there.

Sport Village: Track Houston performed very well at last summer's JO. What,if any, was your part in the program and are you recruiting from the group as well as the area?

Leory Burrell: Track Houston is not affiliated with UH. But they have an outstanding youth program. We have three athletes on our team now and another who will be joining us who came out of their program. We hope to continue that good relationship.

Tim Thompson (Kansas City): How did Jenny Adams make the transition from collegiate athlete to elite athlete, and how is the U.S. going to compete against athletes from other countries that are getting paid to run track?

Leory Burrell: Jenny Adams made a great transition to NCAA track to international track and field. She won five meets on the IAAF circuit last summer.
Athletes from all over the world get paid to run track. Once you make it to that level, golden league meets and grand prix meets, those athletes are getting paid to run. If you are good enough to compete, you will get paid. You have to get to that level first and that is where the difficulty is.

Jumpman, Tallahassee: Who would you say are the top 5 contenders for the national title indoors and outdoors. And how will your team to on the national level?

Leory Burrell: For women, USC is the defending national champions, LSU, Texas, UCLA and South Carolina.
For men, Tennessee is the defending national champions, Arkansas, Stanford, LSU
Last year, our women's team placed sixth indoors and our men's team did not place. We will have a hard time matching that but it depends on how our kids develop. We are hoping to get enough kids into the NCAA meet to make an impact.

Dad (michigan): Hi coach, I have a son in 8th grade who is a sprinter. what advice can we give him to improve his leg strength and achieve a better speed. (11.88 - 100)

Leory Burrell: It's difficult to answer questions like that without seeing them run but I would recommend that you send him to a track camp but especially ours.

Lars (Copenhagen): Do you think your SID, Rick Poulter, is doing a good job promoting your program?

Leroy Burrell: I think Rick is doing a good job. I would like to see a little more content on our web site, but part of the reason I don't see that is that it's hard to get results back to sports information in a timely manner. That's a problem with the sport, not with our sports information office.

Erik DeMarco (Boston): What is it about Texas that HS kids are so far ahead of everyone else in PRs?

Leroy Burrell: Note: PRs are personal records for the athletes.
There are a lot of very good track coaches in Texas at the high school level. We have good weather and good competition. And, you couple that with the way you qualify for the state meet here, which is win or done. That makes for a seriously competitive atmosphere. That leads to the outstanding times that we have here in Texas. But you look at our Olympic team and the best athletes that have come from the U.S. system and they are from all over the country.

EJD (Crazy Carl, MA): How will Houston fare against the other big Texas guns (UT, Baylor, etc) this year?

Leroy Burrell: Our men's program will compete very well against Texas in the sprints. We did that last year. We will be a liitle behind Baylor in the mile relay, which is their strength. A goal of ours is to compete against everyone in our immediate area.

Moderator: Are there any more questions for Coach Burrell before he leaves.

Moderator: Coach Burrell, we thank you for your time today and wish you the best of luck in the upcoming seasons. Thanks to all the fans who participate in today's chat session. Keep your eyes open on the UH web site for additional chats with Coach Burrell in the near future. Thanks again everyone and have a nice day.

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