GREENVILLE – Veteran Greenville track and field coach, Bill Plessinger competed his 23rd year running the program’s five-day track and field camp. The 85-campers in attendance enjoyed the state of the art facilities at the Jennings Center Track and Field Complex on the campus of Greenville Senior High School.
“Just to see what the results are,” Plessinger said is his highlight of the camp. “Just the way they are able to perform because most of these kids unless they have been to track camp before – track is not just a sport like softball, baseball, football. It’s on TV once every four years, it’s not really the most popular sport but it’s great to see kids have the success and how well they do for such a young age.”
Awards are presented to the campers on Friday, the fifth day of the camp before the group heads to the Greenville City Park swimming pool for two hours of swimming, the highlight of the week for the campers.
“Definitely the pool – that’s all they talk about all week,” noted Coach Plessinger, “and it’s funny how that all started.”
“We were at Harmon Field and it was like 110 in the morning and everybody was dyng ,” Plessiger explained. “One of the kids said we need to go to the pool. After a few years you have to do things to the camp.”
“I try not just to encourage track and things but we also play games. When we were kids we played games and what do you do when you play games, you run nonstop. They need to learn to get out and play and run and the exercise so the swimming thing went two fold.”
“It was nice when it was hot and once you start a tradition you can’t get rid of it so it is a permanent thing and swimming is a great workout,” Plessinger added. “It’s low impact on your legs so I try to encourage the kids to do other things to keep active. They’re tired when they get home.”
Coach Plessinger took time to thank the many coaches and high school track and field athletes for their support and help.
“I couldn’t do this without all of my coaches and high school kids,” he said. “It’s all about the help and getting it line up and working out the timeframe.”
“I want to thank my wife Cari. “She makes sure they’re all here and takes care of the t-shirts for the program.”
“Once I get to this week its great because the kids and the coaches do all the work, I just oversee it,” Coach Plessinger stated. “We’ve come a long way in 23-years.”
