This year, two University of Southern California students have the opportunity to compete for that honor. Both are track and field athletes...both are sprinters...one's a male, one's a female...and their paths have been very different. Below are their stories. We'll start with senior Carol Rodriguez.
Where it all began. Carol Rodriguez calls herself a wanderer. She's moved all over as a kid, but says California is her home. And California has been good to her.
. Rodriguez has always been the full package - smart, beautiful, put together, well-spoken, confident, and oh boy, she's an athlete. She began running track her freshman year in high school at Wilson High in Southern California to test out how fast she believed herself to be.
. "I knew I had some kind of speed," she said. "I wanted to see how much. Turns out I was really fast."
. Her older sister Tamika was a sprinter, and Rodriguez attributes much of her success and participation to her sister.
. "If It weren't for her, I never would have gotten into this sport in the first place," she said. "Her being a sprinter definitely focused me too."
. But Tamika is not the only family member who has had an impact on Rodriguez's life and success up to this point. Although divorced, Rodriguez says both her parents, as well as her extended family, have been supportive through and through.
. Her father always pushed her in the realm of sports and track. Her mother pushed her in school, not quite understanding how talented her daughter was as a sprinter until Rodriguez received an athletic scholarship to USC, and her mother attended a few meets.
. "I don't think she even knew how fast I was," Rodriguez said. "Even after I got my scholarship, my mom was more excited about USC's academics than anything else."
Collegiate career
. Success met Rodriguez right away at USC. She was immediately one of the best sprinters on the track and field team her freshman year. She had the the best 200m time for the Trojans, ran her personal best in the 100m, and she anchored a 4x400m team that locked up the eighth-fastest time in USC history.. In her sophomore year, Rodriguez went from being one of the best sprinters on the team, to a force to be reckoned with throughout the country. She placed third at the NCAA Championships held in Sacramento in the 100m (11.38 seconds), fourth in the 200m (22.96 seconds) and third as part of USC's 4x100m relay team. The relay team set a school record with a time of 42.96 seconds.
. Before that, Rodriguez was a four-time winner at the USC/UCLA Dual Meet, setting the school record in the 400m with a time of 51.51 seconds. Her time also set a new Puerto Rican national record. The same year she was chosen as the 2006 Women's Athlete of the Year for Puerto Rico among all female athletes.
. Junior year was more of the same for Rodriguez, and senior year, it only got better. In the last dual meet of the season against rivals UCLA, Rodriguez won the 400m race with a time of 51.39 seconds, bettering her school and Puerto Rican record in the event and posting the best collegiate time this season. The most incredible part of that feat is that she raced with an injured leg. She had pulled her hamstring in practice earlier that week and she was questionable for the meet.
. Rodriguez has always been the kind of teammate who will do anything to help her team win.
"We're so thankful," said her teammate Jessica Onyepunuka in an interview after they won the 4x400m race to close out the dual meet and seal the victory. "She does so much for this team. We wouldn't be the same without her."
. USC track and field Coach Ron Allice says Rodriguez is the most versatile female runner in Trojan history.
. "She can run the short 100m and 200m sprints, and then turn around and run the mid-range 400m sprint," Allice said. "And she wins. There have been a lot of great runners to come through here, and to have your name connected to two school records is an honor...that says it all right there. Those numbers prove my point."
. But it's not just running that makes Rodriguez who she is.
. "I don't think I could ask for a better representative of the Trojan family," Allice said. "She's not only an excellent athlete, she's also intelligent, articulate, a good looking girl...she's the total package."
. The following slide show illustrates her story in pictures.
What the future holds. So Rodriguez's road has been a fairly smooth one. She's enjoyed success from the beginning, and the Olympics just seems like the next logical step for her...the next goal to set for herself.
. And it doesn't get much easier than this - since she's competing for Puerto Rico in the Olympic Games, she's already guaranteed a front row ticket to the international competition. Where Americans need to go to the Olympic qualifiers and do well there, Puerto Rico only requires an athlete to reach the A-standard time, which Rodriguez already has.
. Enjoy China Carol!!
. Click on the following two movies to hear about how she's preparing for the Olympic Games, both from Coach Ron Allice's perspective and her own. (Meriah, these are two of the ones I sent you in your email.)
Moving on to USC senior, and Rodriguez's teammate, Lionel Larry!!
. Ever since he was little, growing up in Compton, CA, Lionel Larry has had a passion for speed. It might have been the danger, maybe the adrenaline...perhaps it was the air blowing past his skin. I think it was probably a combination of all that and more.
. Larry wasn't always a sprinter. In fact, growing up, you couldn't get him off of his dirt bike or go-kart. He's been drag racing since he was a kid, and cars were have been his hobby for as long as he can remember.
. "Cars, cars, cars, cars, and more cars," Larry said. "Before there was a football, before there was a track, there were cars."
. Many of his fondest memories growing up were the times he spent working on cars with his father. His dad taught him how to take them apart, clean them, fix them, put them back together again...you name it, they did it...together.
. Like Rodriguez, Larry's parents have pushed him to be the best he can be his whole life.
"My dad always pushed me," he said. "He never let me give anything up. And my mom, she wouldn't let me do anything unless my grades were right. Without them I wouldn't be where I am today."
. The following slide show is a visual representation of much of his narrative.
The start of something big
. This is how Larry explains the story. He was in sixth grade when he was sitting out in the front of his middle school, waiting for his dad to pick him out. His best friend walked out from behind
the school and sat with him. Lionel asked him where he was coming from. His friend said track practice. Larry figured that instead of just waiting out front for his dad after school, he might as well try the whole track thing out. So he went the next day to practice.. "The rest was history," he said.
. He started running not only with his middle school, but he also joined a club team called Imani, on which he remained a member through high school. Speaking of high school, he went to Dominguez Hills, where he led his team to two CIF Championships and one second-place finish and was a two-time Prep All-American.
. He also went to the Junior Olympics with Imani, and stood on the top podium for three events - the 200m, 4x100m and 4x400m. Running just seemed to come easily to him. He specialized in the short sprints - the 100m and 200m especially.
. Everything was smooth sailing, so it seemed. Coach Ron Allice had even come to a few of Larry's meets and decided that Larry was the one he wanted for USC's team. Allice was in attendance Larry's last high school meet, a meet he'll never forget. Larry injured his leg. And from that point on, everything changed.
Fighting through
. Larry's bread and butter, the 100m and 200m events were no longer his best races. He and Coach Allice got together and decided running the 400m would be the best direction to take his future collegiate career.
. Well, Coach Allice decided that and Larry begrudgingly went along with it.
. "Me and Coach Allice - we've had our differences, but you know, everybody does," Larry said. . "But I'll swear by him. I could never be where I am today if it weren't for him. He's such a good coach, especially a 400m coach."
. But when it comes to the 400m event, there's nothing Larry likes about it.
. "I hate it," Larry said. "You know, running always kind of hurts, but the 400...now that really hurts...every time."
. But Larry has used that as inspiration. The way he looks at it, if he's going to hate it, he might as well not lose and make matters worse for himself. So he's pushed himself through. And it was definitely a struggle, as Larry was plagued with injury throughout his entire collegiate career.. Although another hamstring injury ended his successful freshman season early, Larry ed the U.S. 4x100m relay team to a gold medal at the Pan-American Junior Championships that August, running the first leg to give the U.S. a lead they would not relinquish.
. Larry had a more stable season his sophomore year. He finished the season on a roll, setting new PRs in teh 400m in almost every meet.
Junior season only looked up for Larry. He ran the third fastest 400m time in USC history and ran for team USA at the World Championships in Japan (although an injury got in his way there too). He was named the Pac-10 Male Track Athlete of the Year for his outstanding season and placed second in a photo finish at the NCAA Championships by .02 seconds to Ricardo Chambers of Florida State.
. Even with Larry's setbacks, Coach Ron Allice calls him an integral part of the team.. "Lionel's a leader by nature," said Allice. "The rest of the team follows his lead. I really feel that this team's success will depend on how much Lionel pushes himself, and the example he sets for the rest of the team."
. And Larry was a bright light to the season. In the USC/UCLA dual meet - the most recent meet - Larry was a four-time winner. He was part of the winning 4x400m relay team, the 4x100m relay team and won the 200m and 400m races. His winning time in the 400m race of 45.04 seconds was the second fastest collegiete time this season and the fourth best in the world.
Olympics on the horizon
. Unlike Rodriguez, Larry will need to wait until the Olympic trials in June to compete for his spot on the USA Olympic team. But with his World Championship experience last year in Japan, he thinks he's ready for it.
. Larry will meet stiff competition, both in the trials and if he makes the team, in Beijing at the Olympics. But that won't get in the way of his dream - his goal..."making the podium."
To hear from him and his coach about the next steps in preparation for the Olympics, click on the videos below. (Or Meriah, these are more that I sent to you.)
Long-standing tradition. Both Rodriguez and Larry have the potential to go down in USC's long line of Olympic athletes and medal-winners.
. One hundred and 42 Trojans have competed in the Olympic Games, winning 41 Olympic gold medals, and that is just in track and field. Since the 1912 Stockholm Olympics Games, a Trojan has medaled in every Summer Olympics and has earned a gold medal in every Summer Games except five ('60, '80, '84, '88, and '00).
. At the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, USC's Felix Sanchez won a gold medal in the 400m hurdles and Allyson Felix won a silver in the 200m. Also competing were Julien Kapek in the triple jump, Natasha Mayers in the 100m, Julianna Tudja in the hammer and current Trojan Manjula Wijesekara in the high jump.
. Below is a map of some of the American athletes that went to USC, and also won gold in the Olympic Games. The athletes are located by birth city, and range from the 1912 Stockholm Games to the 2004 Athens Games.
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