Meet Jeremy Birck. He is a great student, culturally diverse, and very friendly. He also happens to be one of the top competitors for the high jump in the state of Illinois.
Birck originally began the high jump in sixth grade because he was too young to tryout out for basketball, but wanted to be able to make the team for the next season. He decided to try the high jump, and ended it up sticking with it. Birck said that, “I like high jump because it is an individual sport and I have nobody to blame for faults except for myself.”
Birck practices the high jump during the spring and summer with the track and field team. During his off-season, he also plays football and basketball to stay in shape, as it is difficult to get to high jump facilities.
A typical practice for Birck includes first doing the sprint workouts with the rest of the track team, and then moving to the high jump pit with his coach, Mike Larsen. For Birck, working on technique and form is more important than height.
In the high jump, the athlete runs with a “J-Curve” approach at the bar, which is at a set height. They then throw their arms back and lean backwards as far as possible to clear the bar. Each jumper gets three attempts to clear the bar. If they succeed, they get moved to the next round and the bar is moved up two inches. However, if they fail, they are immediately eliminated.
As a sophomore, Birck jumped to heights that launched him to the All-State competition, where he jumped 6’5”. This score was good enough to place him as ninth in the state. “Going to state as a sophomore was almost overwhelming. I had no idea what to expect but I just treated it as another meet, and the last meet of the season, so my mindset was just to make the best of it,” said Birck.
However, he did not stop there. He managed to increase the height of his ump by three inches to where his top score is now set, at 6’8” (cleared in July of 2009).
To prepare for a jump, Birck listens to relaxing music and tries not to get too overly pumped up. According to him, he tends to perform the best when he is relaxed and having fun.
Birck stated that he is most influenced by other athletes that he has been on teams with, not to mention his coaches, Larsen, Albin, and Murphy. “The passion that some of my previous teammates have shown has really become contagious to me and inspired me.”
Birck hopes to continue jumping in college for a division-one school, which he said has been his ultimate goal since his eighth grade year. He also keeps in mind that in order to get into a college that will reflect his potential, he needs to keep his grades up, “even though I like sports more than I do academics; the academics is a requirement.”
photo courtesy of Jeremy Birck