lawgator1
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You guys need more speed. A lot more. Here's an Orlando Sentinel article on what UF is doing to improve itself in that respect. Fulmer could take a lesson here..
GAINESVILLE -- The meeting took place 18 months ago, and the message delighted Florida track and field Coach Mike Holloway.
Urban Meyer, the new guy in charge in the football office, had tracked down Holloway to share a goal. Achieving it, Meyer hinted, would help bring both men championships.
"He said he wanted his team to be the fastest in the country," Holloway recalled this spring. "And he wanted more of his guys to come run for me."
So started a partnership that has stretched deep into its second year and bolstered Florida's football and track programs. The coaches communicate often, mostly during recruiting season.
"Mike Holloway has been great to work with," Meyer said. "He's a real team guy. He comes to recruiting breakfasts and helps us as much as he can."
The fruits of the relationship will come this winter when freshmen Percy Harvin and Wondy Pierre-Louis compete in major indoor and outdoor meets.
Pierre-Louis won the Florida Class 4A long- and triple-jump championships in 2005. The same spring, Harvin won four individual gold medals and a relay gold in the Virginia state championships, the first such feat in 69 years.
Neither participated in track and field state meets this year, but Holloway said both are slated to come back to the sport this school year. Harvin can't wait.
"I love running track," he said in May. "It's just me out there, running as fast as I can."
Harvin and Pierre-Louis will be the first Gators football players to run track since 2004 when Dee Webb sprinted after his freshman football season. In recent years, the most famous dual-sport star at Florida was John Capel, a wide receiver and NCAA champion sprinter who eventually won a world track title and pursued an NFL career.
Capel's crossover came when Steve Spurrier coached the football team and Holloway was the track team's associate head coach. Like Meyer, Spurrier encouraged his athletes to play both sports, Holloway said. But the football-track relationship was less open under former coach Ron Zook.
"It wasn't that Coach Zook dissuaded it, but he didn't really seek it out," Holloway said. "Coach Spurrier was open to it. And Coach Meyer, man, he really wants to see it happen."
Meyer speaks with envy about his previous coaching stops, where several players ran track in the offseason. But a look around his state and league show that the practice seems popular almost everywhere else.
Michael Ray Garvin, a member of Florida State's 4 x 100 relay team that helped the Seminoles win a team national title in June, is a defensive back for Bobby Bowden.
Xavier Carter, whom Meyer feared as a return man when the Gators and LSU met a year ago, recently left the Tigers to turn pro in track and field and signed a six-year endorsement deal with Nike.
And Miami's successful track programs have been anchored by sprinters Santana Moss, Andre Johnson and Devin Hester, all football players. 'Canes Sinorice Moss and Kelly Jennings participated in both sports a year ago.
For 18 months, Meyer and Holloway have worked toward creating a similar situation at UF. Meyer hopes to see some early returns soon.
"We'd love to have a relay team of football players," Meyer said. "I would love to see that."
