He kept his white hair clipped close, in militiary style, but there was nothing stuffy about the coach. He would stand before us at the beginning of practice, a pixey gleam in his eye, and he'd challenge the biggest or the fastest or the most confident among us to some form of contest usually involving shooting baskets or kicking footballs. The coach was definitely not a runner. There was always a milkshake wager, to make the game more interesting. Over the four years I ran with the coach, he won most of his wagers, but he never collected, or attempted to collect any of those milkshakes. The milkshakes and the stories about the athletic exploits of his feeble grandmother were some of the methods Coach Rumana used to keep us loose and to make running cross country something we looked forward to each day.

Coach Rumana was very successful at making running fun. Under his sparkling gaze I learned to love running for running's sake, and because of those lessons, I have achieved more from the sport and have stayed with it longer than almost anyone I have known.

Henry Pohl was the head track coach. He was also the head of the school's science department and the "discipline heavy" for the Vice Principal. He was tall and lean, a little like Abe Lincoln without the whiskers, a serious man indeed. Coach Pohl had been a Pole Vaulter during his undergraduate years and was more confortable with sprinters and jumpers than distance runners.

Coach Pohl didn't seem to know a great deal about coaching distance runners, but he was a great deal smarter than I had ever imagined. Over the Easter Vacation of my Junior year, a coach from a near-by Catholic School used our track to train the state champion quarter miler. During that week, this coach whose name I can't remember, sought me out, bolstered my ego, gave me some tips on running form and a series of drills to correct my weaknesses, a philosophy of training and two key workouts I could use to prepare for racing.

Coach Pohl appeared to ignore this coaching I was receiving and seemed pleased to let me go my own way. When we returned to school, I worked out at the same time as the rest of the team, but after our warmup, I trained by myself, completing my own workouts based on the principals I had learned from this other coach. The effect of these new workouts was startling, I went from one of the better distance runners on the team to the top miler in the county by the end of the season. The following year I broke the state record for the mile and earned a college scholarship.

Coach Rumana was so happy and friendly, it was easy to love him and give him his credit due. The tips I learned from the mystery coach had such a dramatic effect, it was easy to credit him, but Coach Pohl was more distant, and it took me twenty years to realize his gift exceeded them all. Coach Pohl was a master psychologist and he always knew how to prepare me to race my best when the races really counted. He scarcely ever spoke to me, but when he did, he knew exactly what to say to bolster my confidence and the exact moment when I needed to hear it most. Looking back, his timing was uncanny. The five most important races of my high school career were run under his guidance, and I ran to my potential in every race.

For eighteen years I thought it was a coincidence that the mystery coach showed up on our track for those five days. For eighteen years I thought it was a coincidence that this coach singled me out from all the other boys and spent time instilling me with the knowledge I needed to move ahead. I even thought Coach Pohl let this other coach talk to me because he just didn't care about distance runners. It took me eighteen years to realize that Coach Pohl cared a lot, the mystery coach came to our school because Coach Pohl wanted him there, he worked with me because Coach Pohl wanted him to and the reason Coach Pohl knew what to say and when to say it was, because he cared enough to study me very carefully. He knew what made me tick better than any coach before or since.

It was 1985 when I first realized the contribution Coach Pohl had made to my life; I made a trip to New Jersey to properly thank him, but sadly learned he was four years cold in the ground by then. Eventhough I had loved Coach Rumana I never properly thanked him either. He died while I was in college. I may never learn the identity of the mystery coach, and the other two are dead, so how can I repay the kindness I have received?

Whether we choose to realize it or not, not one of us is a "self made man or woman." Each of us owes a debt to the Coach Pohls, the Coach Rumanas and the unknown teachers of our lives. No one stands alone, and wherever we stand there is always someone watching. Each of us is the role model for someone else, and the best way we can honour our treasured role models is to serve as treasured role models for future generations.