A former track and field athlete at Carbondale Community High School impacts the school by becoming the new head Track Coach.

Coach+Gary+mykel+is+watching+one+of+his+athletes+and+coaching+them+on+their+jumping+form.++He+tells+them+what+they+could+do+better.

Coach Gary mykel is watching one of his athlete’s and coaching them on their jumping form. He tells them what they could do better.

Phoenix Richard

 Coach Gary Mykel is the new head track coach for Carbondale Community High School. He was a former runner on Carbondale’s track team from 2010 to 2014. He was a three sport athlete at Carbondale, where he also wrestled and played football. He went to siu for college, and was on the track team from 2015-2016. He started his coaching career at Marion High School, where he was the head track and cross country coach for a year. Last year, he was an assistant coach for Carbondale’s track team.

Many runner’s on the Carbondale’s track team think that coach g has had a positive impact on them and he does a great job as a coach. He is very direct and desvive in his actions as a coach. He tells his athletes that commitment to the team is very important so that they learn how to be a part of the team and learn that their actions affect the team as a whole. 

The mental mindset his athletes have is very important to him. He wants his athletes to always have a positive mindset going into a meet so that they will get the best results in their race. Responsibility/accountability is another key thing that he stresses as a coach, because he wants his runners to learn from their mistakes and learn discipline when they are wrong. Mykel tells his runners that there is no excuse for something they did wrong and that when they learn that they will hold themselves accountable for their mistakes. As a coach, he wants the athletes on the team to take care of their health so that they do not become injured.  He says that nutrition and eating healthy foods will help the runner’s on his team perform better in their races. Mykel reminds his athletes that nothing will be handed to them, they have to earn everything. For example the athletes on the team have to earn a spot on the travel roster to be able to compete at meets. 

Coach g hopes that his coaching style impacts the team in a way that will help them get better results in their races. He said “I would like to think that my coaching style influences them to strive for more and want bigger things.” He wants his athletes to not be content with their results in their races and to always improve their performance. 

He tells his athletes “you get out of this,what you put into it.” This means that he thinks that his athletes will get the results they want, when they put in their best effort into everything they do during the season. Also he thinks that if an athlete does not work hard during practice,then they will not see the results that they want.

 Coach G started out in the physical therapy world in college, but the pace was too slow for him. He has been around sports his entire life and he really enjoys it. When he was running in college he got the opportunity from one of his coaches to coach a club track team in Marion called swamp fox. This was his first opportunity to be able to coach a team. He says “I worked with this woman named Sarah Baker and she was at the time the head girls track coach for Marion high school. In 2018 when I was finishing my bachelors degree they had an opening for an assistant coach and she asked me if I wanted to do it because she liked how I ran things at the camp.” That was his first opening into the world of coaching and eventually he came to Carbondale high school to help coach track. This year he became the head track coach for Carbondale.

Coach g is watching Elsie Hutchinson practice long jump and coaching her on what she could do better.