From World Champion to Living Inspiration
Sports: Heidenreich beats the odds to succeed in athletics and academics
By I. Donnell Moore;Times Sports Writer; Kerrville Times
February 25, 2008
The name Stephen Heidenreich may not mean much in this part of the country, but back in Indiana he is a "Legend" - literally.
The Kerrville resident was among the former Indiana University runners honored on monuments unveiled last month at Legends Park in Bloomington, Ind. The collection of limestone slabs on the IU cross country championship course frame pictures that serves as a tribute to some of the Hoosiers' cross country and track NCAA champions, world-record holders and Olympian.
Heidenreich, a member of the Indiana University Hall of Fame, certainly qualifies. The first IU runner to break the four-minute mark in the mile, he won the Big Ten title in the mile in 1975 and earned a silver medal in the 1500 meter race at the World University Games. Before that, Heidenreich reached the NCAA cross country national championships as a freshman, where he got the opportunity to compete with another future running legend: Steve Prefontaine.
Heidenreich is also a member of the Howard Wood Dakota Relays Hall of Fame and the Watertown Hall of Fame. His home town is Watertown, South Dakota and he set a record in the 4x880 yard at the Howard Wood Dakota Relay Track Meet held in Sioux Falls, South Dakota in 1970 to earn induction into its Hall of Fame.
"I thought I was a really good runner," Heidenreich said. "But Steve Prefontaine showed me what speed was. He humbled me when we were down in Tennessee (at the NCAA championship meet). He started out like a sub-four minute miler and I saw him from behind the rest of the way."
The South Dakota native - whose former IU cross country coach Sam Bell called "the most competitive kid I've coached" - might have reached Prefontaine-like status, but Heidenreich's running career was cut short when he was struck by a hit-and-run driver just months before the U.S. Olympic Trials.
"You never think a person is going to run you down from behind, so I never saw it coming,"Heidenreich said. "You kind of think that it was on purpose or a joke or something. All I remember was waking up."
Heidenreich was taking a study break - a five-mile run on a two-way street - and paid little attention to the lights that flooded his peripheral vision. It was one time he should have looked behind him, because a vehicle struck Heidenreich from behind, sending him flying head over heels to the pavement.
"A graduate student who had been an EMT in the Army saw me," Heidenreich said. "So he was having flashbacks when he saw me. He came to my rescue and waved down another car. He told the other driver to call for an ambulance right away,saying, "this young man doesn't have much time."
Bell said he thought about Heidenreich as soon as they found out it was a cross-country runner.
"It was a late night, and I was already in bed when the call came," the coach said. "I thought all my runners were in bed, too, but then I remembered that "Heidi" liked to run late and I knew it was him. I called his mother and informed her before heading to the hospital."
Heidenreich required multiple surgeries and remained in the hospital for several weeks after he had a metal plate inserted in his head.
Once he was released from the hospital, the Indiana student had the mental capacity of a 2-year old.
Informed by the doctors, that his mind, like his body, was healing and so he would regain 90 percent of his mental capacity in the first year - the rest would trickle back during the next seven years.
But, his Olympic dreams were put on hold.
"It's sad because I think I would have made the Olympics that year and Coach Bell thinks so too," Heidenreich said.
Heidenreich went back to school and, despite struggling at first, stuck with it and graduated from IU in 1977.
"I put all the focus that I used for athletics into academics and I made it through," he said. "I would do assignments three times just to understand them. In a business class, I once raised my hand and asked the professor what a debit was. That's how bad it was for me."
Heidenreich trained for the 1980 Olympics, but failed to qualify. It signified the end of his athletic career, but he went on to earn a Master's degree in business in 1984 and a Master's degree in Health administration in 1995.
In 1999, he began teaching in Colorado Springs, and this year he and his wife, Dode, moved to Texas to be closer to his mother-in-law.
Now 31 years after the accident, Heidenreich teaches at Center Point High School and is an assistant coach for a variety of sports.
"I decided to teach because it just seemed important to me," Heidenreich said. "I put so much effort in athletics and once I transferred that energy to academics - despite my accident - I found a way to make things happen." "But you want to know why I teach youth? Because they can be successful at anything. Hard work and persistence works both ways - in academics and athletics."
And if anyone would know that, it would be a "Legend."
Contact I. Donnell Moore at donnell.moore@dailytimes.com
