When he arrived at St. Michaels University School from Taiwan midway through his Grade 10 year, it was immediately evident to everyone that Leupold Wang could jump.
Blue Jags’ basketball and volleyball coaches immediately recognized his outstanding vertical and overall athleticism and he was quickly encouraged to become a member of both those SMUS squads in short order.
However, Wang didn’t see himself as a jumper – at least not in the pure track and field sense. He had done some high jump and long jump as part of phys-ed back home in Tianmu, but that’s about it.
“I just thought I was a basketball player,” Wang, now 17, says with a smile. “Up to Grade 11, I was set on basketball.”
Fast forward to the end of his Grade 12 year at SMUS and Wang now certainly sees himself as a track and field athlete. Beginning Thursday, he will represent SMUS at the BC Championships in Nanaimo in high jump, triple jump and long jump.
And beginning this fall, he will take his track and field talents to a new level – joining Clemson University’s team as a jumper on partial scholarship. Wang committed to the Tigers, an Atlantic Coast Conference sports powerhouse, in January of this year. He will study business at Clemson, which is located in South Carolina.
“If you had told me a couple of years ago that this would be happening, I’d say ‘that’s crazy’,” Wang says.
Wang has overcome three serious left ankle sprains in the last 1½ years, injuries that hampered his volleyball and basketball pursuits. But he is healthy now and hoping to break the 2.0-metre mark in the high jump during the next few months. He cleared 1.96 metres at this year’s Lower Island championship meet and then tied for first at Islands, losing only on a countback. He also took gold in triple jump and fourth in long jump at the Island meet.
Helping him to work toward his goals has been club coach Dacre Bowen of the Victoria Speed Project.
“I know I can do it,” Wang says of the 2.0-metre mark. “I’ve been training for it.”
Wang believes he is better prepared mentally for this year’s BC meet after a disappointing provincial meet last year. He and Bowen have been working on mental cues that help him to execute the various phases of his jumps.
His goals for the summer include clearing 2.05 metres, which would give him a shot at the Canadian Under-20 team and also influence the decision on whether or not he will redshirt his first year at Clemson.
The Tigers became interested in Wang after he emailed Clemson, along with a number of other U.S. schools, sending them his statistics as well as video clips. Clemson Jumps Coach Joe Davis told Wang they believe they can help him with technique to harness his natural talent.
“He told me that he thought he could take a chance on me as a high jumper based on my raw athletic ability,” Wang says.
That athletic ability helped Wang become a contributor to both the SMUS basketball and volleyball programs over the past three years. And those sports, in turn, helped him to develop as a track and field athlete, as did his overall experience at SMUS.
“Basketball and volleyball helped me get good at track,” Wang says. “And just being able to go to the gym whenever I wanted [was beneficial].”
Wang says there is a key difference between the team sports and high-level track and field.
“With track and field, you go to practice and everything is so technical,” he says. “You have to take every single rep as seriously as you can. You can’t just grind your way into being really good.”
At the recent Lower Island Track and Field Championships, Grade 12 student Leupold Wang recently won first place in each of the senior boys’ high jump, long jump and triple jump to win the meet’s prestigious high-aggregate award for the third year in a row.
