Janet Brown Loves to Compete
Seventeen-year-old senior Janet Brown demonstrated a natural athletic ability to the Great Bridge Wildcats varsity girls’ track team during her illustrious high school career there. She competed in six events, including the shot put, discus, long jump, triple jump, 100-meter dash and the 4x100 relay. She was ranked first in the Southeastern district and was among the top athletes in the Eastern Region.
These notable accomplishments are all in a day’s work for Brown. “I just love to compete,” she says. “It is an inner drive that I have that keeps me going. When I’m at a meet the atmosphere really gets me excited.”
Brown got involved in track and field when she lived in California several years ago. Since that time, she has continually improved, demonstrating her ability to place well at the state level both in indoor and outdoor competition.
Being one of Virginia’s top athletes, however, is no easy task. It requires intensive training that focuses on every element that will influence how Brown performs at meets. She explains that much of the time, her coaches simulate conditions and variables she will encounter at track meets so that there will be no surprises when it is time to compete. “I focus on a lot of technical parts of track, such as lowering my hips when I’m jumping or relaxing when I’m running,” she says.
Staying focused is not only a critical determinant in how one will perform at meets, according to Brown, but it also plays a big role in how one’s high school career will pan out. “You have to keep your mind on what you’re doing,” she says. “Being dedicated applies both to the field and to the classroom.”
Brown goes beyond attributing her success to individual initiative. In addition to the countless hours of work she puts in refining her technique, the people around her play a big supporting role. “My dad, Charles Brown, Jr., is a big influence. He helps me get ready to compete mentally. He motivates me and that really helps out on the track.”
Coach Pat Banks explains that Brown fulfills more than one function for the Wildcats. She is one of the region’s best athletes allowing the Wildcats to garner points and advance to elevated levels of competition. But as a fixture on the team, she has also been critical to moral support and guidance. “She is certainly a leader by being there for the other team members, especially the younger ones,” says Banks.
In addition to Brown, Great Bridge fielded several other standouts this year, including senior Katherine Telfeyan, a distance runner who will be attending Washington and Lee in the fall, and junior Kristy Tobin, a state champion mile runner.
Banks, who has been coaching at Great Bridge since 1975, explains that track and field, for athletes such as Brown, Telfeyan and Tobin, often means more than competing with teammates at the varsity level. “For athletes of this ability, track is often a free education in the form of a ticket to college.”
For Banks, it is refreshing to see very strong athletes in his program for several reasons. First, the future of any athletic programs is sometimes hard to predict. Numerous factors, such as injuries, can effect how a team’s composition will actually pan out. Further, having good performers helps compensate for losses that a team suffers due to graduation. For example, the Wildcats graduated five seniors last year who made a strong showing, helping them to clinch the district in 2005. Finally, the individual nature of the sport allows teams to field small teams of strong athletes at the regional and state levels who have managed to garner a lot of points.
One reason Banks is proud to have Brown on the team is the tremendous standings she has made in regional competition. “She was instrumental in helping us make headway in this district,” explains Banks. “This is one of the toughest districts in the state. With Deep Creek, Western Branch and, outside of the district, Bethel on the Peninsula, the competition around here is stiff.”
Through it all, however, Brown has held her own, winning four gold medals at the Norview Invitational and three at the CNU Invitational. Brown will continue competing in track and field at the collegiate level, perhaps at Hampton University, and plans on studying to enter the medical field.
