Obstacles not insurmountable for Masters athletes.

Byline: Paula Lincoln The Register-Guard

TRACK & FIELD

HAYWARD CLASSIC

Gary Stenlund's life has finally come full circle.

Today, the tall, trim, toned and tan Stenlund looks every bit the successful masters athlete he proved he is Saturday at the 25th Annual Hayward Classic Northwest Regional Masters Track & Field Championships at Hayward Field.

Once an Olympic athlete whose life took a slow downward spiral before a new bride and the threat of jail time helped him turn it around, the 65-year-old Stenlund threw the javelin 186 feet, 9 inches to set an apparent world record in the men's 65-70 age division.

Stenlund threw 185-2 at a meet at Mount Hood Community College in Gresham two weeks ago and Saturday he said that mark `is a pending world record, and this mark's a little farther.'

There were smiles, handshakes and congratulations all around for Stenlund, whose story is the stuff of made-for-TV movies.

`I made the Olympics in 1968, but I was a raging alcoholic,' said Stenlund, who threw a little over 240 feet at Mexico City.

Stenlund said the serious drinking began with what he called `the normal college drinking' while at OSU.

`I should have been on the U.S. drinking team. If there had been one, I'd have won the gold medal,' said Stenlund, who earned his bachelor's degree in 1963 and his master's degree in 1964.

Stenlund continued to train after graduating and made the U.S. Olympic team. But the drinking continued and Stenlund's athletic potential was never fully realized.

Still, he earned an appointment as a college professor at Ohio University, where he taught from 1965 to 1974 before walking away from a tenured position because he said he thought the university system was screwed up when, in reality, it was he who was screwed up by his drinking.

During the next seven years, Stenlund racked up four DUI citations and was given an ultimatum: enter a treatment program or go to jail. He chose the treatment program and, with the help of his wife, Patricia, whom he'd married just four months before his last DUI, he finally quit drinking in 1982.

`Without her help, I would be dead," Stenlund said. "I never would have lived to be 50.'

`This is where it's at for me," Stenlund added. "I have a lot of history here (at Hayward Field). This is so incredible for me.'

Corvallis' Zel Brook, on the other hand, hopes her story will serve as an inspiring rather than cautionary tale for other athletes, who, like herself, may be plagued by illness, injury or regulations which she thinks are discriminatory.

Brook, 59, who races with a cane to counter balance problems arising from an operation to remove a brain tumor, kept a steady pace throughout the 10,000-meter race she ran Saturday morning.

`I'm so glad to be here," Brook said. "It's been a long wait, but everybody has been really friendly. I just want to encourage anyone who thinks they can't do it, to give it a shot.'

`In the back of my mind I was hoping everything would go smoothly and it did," Brook said. "I'm delighted to be here. I ran faster than I thought the pace would be. I was picking it up. I wanted to finish strong.'

CAPTION(S):

Corvallis' Zel Brook competes in the 10,000-meter race at the Hayward Classic on Saturday.