Robert Young

I met with the magical 4th graders at Guy Lee Elementary School in Springfield, Oregon. Mrs. Skoog is their teacher. The kids read The Magic of A.C. Gilbert, wrote letters to the business (Pathways Physical Therapy) that sponsored the book, and drew pictures for a timeline that highlighted A.C. Gilbert’s life.

What a great pleasure it was to hear what the students learned about this fascinating man. He was an famous Oregonian during his life, but many people today haven’t even heard of him. Feel free to share what you know about this interesting and accomplished guy in the Comments below.

Teachers learning about A.C. at a conference.

Three Questions is a periodic feature of this blog. The focus is on three questions asked of everyday people involved in curious pursuits.

The subject of this Three Questions post is Hugh Fullagar, sports science coordinator at the University of Oregon. He works in the athletic department and his job is to collect data to help improve player performance and reduce injuries. One of his many duties involves attaching GPS units to the Duck football players’ shoulder pads and collecting information during practices and games that helps coaches make decisions.

1. What experiences did you have that made you want to become a sports scientist?

I’ve always been deeply involved and passionate about sports since I was a kid. As I got older, when I realized I was no good at playing sports, I became really interested in the behind-the-scenes work within elite sport (e.g. coaching, recruitment, tactics, fitness, medical) and during my studies at university I was able to experience and link up with many of these fields in numerous sports. The link between science and sport probably started with my lecturers and supervisors from my universities and then speaking and building relationships with people practicing in the field. Once I realized that much of being a sport scientist is not just about being knowledgeable, but also about how you interact with the people around you, I realized that this is something I love doing. Working and meeting with the variety of people and the different relationships built up around the world is both fun and extremely rewarding.

2. What are the most and least interesting parts of your job?

The most interesting would have to be sitting down with people who are far more experienced than me (i.e. head coach and medical staff, senior athletes, university supervisors) and discussing philosophies not just behind sport science but sport performance in general. Listening to people who are more experienced than yourself is critical to the learning process and continually improving. The least interesting part is definitely cleaning the porta-potty after football games (the Ducks have a collapsible bathroom on their sideline during games.) Don’t let sport science nerds fool you; we are a jack of all trades!

Okay, most of the pictures are done. Recorded interviews (60) have been heard, and notes taken. A rough (very rough) outline has been made. Now it’s time to get serious.

Well, not real serious. After all, this is going to be a book for kids, not an article for an encyclopedia. It’s going to have to be informative, engaging, WoW-producing, and fun.

The challenge, as with all faction (non-fiction) projects, is selecting the right material to include. I’ve gotten enough information to write a 100-page book, easily. However, this book will be 48 pages, and include photographs. So, this will require a special kind of selectivity, and always with readers in mind.

I have already started my draft, and each day I return to it to revise. This does not always happen in my office on the computer. This happens throughout the day. and night. Last night as I lay in bed, I contemplated some of the details I had included in my draft. Will they stay or will they go?

Only time will tell.

The past several weeks have been, indeed, crunch time for my latest project. With only three football games left on the home schedule, I’ve had to hustle to gather the information I need for my Game Day with the Oregon Ducks book. During the weeks, I interviewed key people involved in game day. And then, on the day of the games, I observed, took notes, and interviewed some more. Luckily, I had a great research assistant, so we could divide up the game day work.

To date, I have hours of recorded interviews and a stack of pages filled with notes. Oh, did I mention photos? I’ve got more than 3,000 shots done by the talented Jack Liu. We’ll be needing between 40 and 50 for the book, so there’ll be tons of editing to do. And we’re not done gathering, either. Jack still has more photos to take, and I’ve got interviews and follow-ups to do.

When all that’s completed, the writing comes. I have a good idea as to the format since I’m using my baseball Game Day book as a model. But, there will be differences with this book. It’ll be more specific to one team (the baseball book was more generic), and it will include more facts. I’ve even played with style and tone, but that’s really getting ahead of things. Still, it’s fun, and writing does not have to follow a strict linear path.

Here are some photos I took as I researched. These will be helpful reminders as I recall my observations and experiences.

Band warm-up, by groups

Special teams’ mat

Setting up the sideline

Coaches’ headsets

Five minutes to kickoff

Revving up the Harley

Halftime interview with the coach

A few years back, I wrote Game Day, a behind-the scenes look at a major league baseball game. I was pleased with how the book turned out, and at the positive response it got. Since then, I’ve been exploring other venues for behind-the-scenes looks. I completed one manuscript, Around the Clock at an Aquarium, that it now being marketed. Another idea percolating was a college football game.

Last spring I, along with Mighty Oregon magazine publisher Jerry Thompson, approached the University of Oregon to get the permission needed to gain access for the information I’d have to have. Permission did not come lightly. It took lining up a publisher (QSL) and obtaining a license. These took eight painstaking months.

Last week I got the official go-ahead and flew into action. Armed with media passes for my research assistant (Ava Litton) and me, we attended the UO vs. Cal game. The journey officially began. We met in the press box with the photographer for the project, Jack Liu, and brainstormed image possibilities. Then we were off, in and around the stadium, observing the goings-on.

The fantabulous Jack Liu, with his homemade camera rain protector.

Spectators had not be admitted yet, but there was lots going on. The band practiced, the bench areas were set up, the photographers connected their computers and readied them for uploading their pictures. Some of the players were on the field, stretching, running, and playing catch.

Linebacker Rodney Hardrick does his pre-game warm-up, despite the distraction.

Thanks to the generous help of Dave Williford, head of football communications, we got oriented to the many facets (and there are many!) of the press box. Thinking about all the behind-the-scenes parts of a game was a bit overwhelming, but we’ll have two more games to gather info. There’s also time during the week to interview people.

Starting Monday after the game, I got on it and have made contact with some players as well as the head athletic trainer, equipment manager, guys in charge of the food, and the head of tickets. There’s lots more to go, but the flow of information has started. The challenge before the next game is to replay the interview tapes and take notes. I’ll be making a timeline of game day to help me organize the information.

There’s lots of helmet choices.

Locker-room living-room

Gratefully, I’ll have all winter to work on the writing part. I’ll need it!

So, we’re hurtling down the narrow highway in a mini-bus—a marshrutka—on the way to Stepantsminda, a small town near Georgia’s border with Russia. We’re packed in tight, Tyler and I taking up two of the four back row seats. Any other seat would have been preferable, but people claimed them before us, and they paid by having to sit in blistering heat while we waited outside in the shade.

Tyler has the window seat and I sit with the aisle in front of me, which provides a little stretching area since the fold-down seat that would fill that space is the only seat unfilled. On the other side of me sits a middle-aged man, thick and glowering. He staked out his territory early, opening his legs as far as his chubby hips allow. I, however, won the shoulder battle, and rested my back against the seat while he leaned forward.

Two hours into the ride, the driver brakes hard and swerves onto the shoulder of the road. He talks excitedly on his cell phone, then slams the gearshift into reverse and starts backing down the highway. BACKING DOWN THE HIGHWAY! This is not just a little country road with no traffic. This is a highway with cars and trucks whizzing by, most of them blowing their horns at us.

Unaffected by the horn blasts, the driver continues, using his side mirrors to guide his erratic path. The response from inside the bus is silence, except for the guy sitting in front of us who snorts with laughter. My heart is racing and my breathing shallow as I imagine a fiery death for us all, except for the idiot driver who will most likely be thrown to safety. Isn’t that the way these things usually go?

We continue on—backwards—not for a hundred yards or two, but for several miles. When the bus finally comes to a stop, the driver jumps out and races to the back of the vehicle, where he greets an old bearded man walking along the road. The driver ushers the man to the side of the bus, pulls open the sliding door, and points to the only available space, the fold-down seat in front of me.

The bearded man slowly surveys his sole seat option as well as the mass of humanity inside the bus. He speaks to the driver in Georgian and the driver responds, their voices rising over the sounds of the cars and trucks whooshing by us. And then, the driver slams the door closed, gets back behind the wheel, and drives as the man watches us leave. Forward. At last.

I stretch my legs out into the empty space in front of me and wonder how many more hours until we reach our destination.

You never know where the winds of interest will blow the writing fires. I have reveled in the vast lands of nonfiction most of my writing life, but I’ve also braved the world of novels, short stories, plays, and poetry as well. Lately, I have entered an area in which I have always had interest: screen writing.

This is not my first experience with this type of writing. Years back, I took a screenwriting class, got enthused, and wrote a few Seinfeld scripts that landed me an agent but no sales. “It’s written in-house,” the agent told me. “If you want to write scripts, write an original screenplay (= movie).”

I grumbled, groused, and then moved on to other projects that excited me. Years passed, and then one day I was in Seattle, visiting a friend and viewing a few Mariner baseball games. As usual during that time, the Mariners were not doing too well and the papers reported that the team was considering firing their manager.

What if? I thought. What if they decided to hire a nonprofessional—just a regular guy who coached kids—to finish out the season? And what if this guy was having challenges of his own at the time?

These questions became the seeds for my story, and the tagline (every movie has one) became “A man takes on baseball. And himself.”

I thought about this for a year, and for the past six months I have worked at trying to transport it from my head to paper. Along the way I have read books on the craft (including the technical aspects of the genre), read other screenplays, watched lots of movies, and took copious notes.

What I enjoyed was the spare nature of the writing: it’s mostly dialogue and some directions, but little room for description. That also makes it challenging, too. Descriptions help you create context and make smooth transitions.

Last week I finished the first draft, one hundred fifteen pages of it. Like every first draft I have ever done, there was relief involved, relief that the story had held together to its conclusion. Is the story any good? I don’t know. Really, I don’t. I have printed it out and set it aside. At some point in time—a week, a month, five years—I’ll return to the script, this time with fresh eyes and I’ll read it.

And then I’ll get to work, the real work, of rewriting it. How long will that take? I don’t have a clue. A couple weeks. A month. A year. As long as it takes, until I’m satisfied.

And then what? Then, I’ll try to find a home for it, a home where the script can be made into a movie. This will be a daunting task, indeed, and the odds will be long. Maybe not as long as singing at the Met or batting cleanup for the Orioles, but the chances of my script ever being made into a movie are slim.

So, why take the time to work on such a project in the first place, when the odds are clearly against you and where other avenues of writing provide you with a much better chance for success? The answer is simple: You never know. You just never know.