Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech is by far one of the most recognizable and quoted speeches in American history. For Jared Schuurmans, his dream is to one day represent his country in the Olympic Games. The Norfolk, Nebraska, native will take a step towards that dream this week when he competes with 23 other American athletes at the United States Track & Field Championships in Eugene, Oregon, in the discus throw. The meet runs from June 25-28.

Although it will be a tough task to win with three discus throwers having participated in previous Olympic Games, he is expecting to do well.

"I'm not going out there to get second," Schuurmans said. "The odds are not in my favor and sometimes losing is the best motivation. I will try and treat it like any other meet, the throwing ring is the same size, I throw the same discus and it weighs the same. There will just be a few more ‘bigger' competitors."

Leading the way in the discus this year is Casey Malone. Malone is a two-time qualifier for the Olympics and he placed sixth in the 2004 Summer Games held in Athens, Greece. He has a season-best mark of 68.49m (224-08).

Rashaud Scott from the University of Kentucky has the second best mark of the season but struggled at the NCAA Division I Championships and placed 10th this year. The NCAA runner-up in the discus, Ryan Whiting of Arizona State, is a participant in the meet.

Following Scott at the top of the charts are Olympian participants Ian Waltz and Jarred Rome. Waltz participated in the 2004 and 2008 Summer Games while Rome missed out on last year's Olympics but qualified in 2004.

When asked about competing against the best competition out there, Schuurmans feels he has been prepared by the opportunities Doane has provided him. He has participated in several meets with NCAA Division I competition and other top throwers.

For Schuurmans, the task at hand will not be easy but if recent practices are any sign, he will have an opportunity to do well. He enters the meet with a mark of 59.20m (194-03) but has been consistently hitting the low 200s in recent practices.

Jared comes from a track and field family. His dad, Gary, is a coach at Norfolk High School and everyone in his family did track. Gary has been there to keep him focused on the task at hand while his mother, Connie, has continued to be his No. 1 fan.

"Dad is my conscience. If I get too excited before a big meet, he keeps reminding me of my process to prepare. My mom is my biggest fan. She is always so proud of me even when I don't do as well as I wanted to."

When he was younger, he participated in more running events but his older brother would pull him out to the throwing areas to help chase down discuses and shot puts. It was when he was in about fourth grade that he started to learn how to throw the discus. His sisters also had an influence on him as they were throwers as well.

 

"What people forget when they wonder why I'm at a small school is that I chose Doane because I wanted a great education. The other opportunities were there but I felt this would be the best fit for me and the way things have turned out, I definitely made the right choice. You don't have to go to a big time school to be a big time student-athlete."

This past season, Schuurmans re-wrote the record book for the discus throw on three different occasions. He opened the season in Hastings by topping his 2008 best throw by hitting a mark of 182-02, nearly five feet better than his previous best in competition.

Unfortunately, he was injured at the Midland Lutheran College Throws Meet, which he won. He pulled a muscle in his side and the injury forced him to miss one meet but also limited his practice opportunities.

When he returned to competition, he won the discus and shot put titles in consecutive meets but his discus throws were at least 10 feet shy of the mark he set in the opening meet.

At the end of April, Schuurmans had the opportunity to participate in the Drake Relays for the second time in his career. He would compete against several NCAA Division I athletes and after all throws were made, he stood second amongst the competition. The only one to top him was Daniel Schaerer of Stanford University, who would go on to take third at the NCAA Division I Championships.

Along with his second place finish at Drake, Schuurmans broke his school record with a throw of 56.13m (184-02), hitting the mark on his last throw of the meet.

The strong showing carried over into the next week as he won the shot put and discus at the GPAC Championships, setting a meet record in the discus with a throw of 56.01m (183-09). He received men's performance-of-the-meet honors, which is selected by the conference coaches.

He closed out his preparation for the NAIA Championships with a meet in Seward a week after the conference titles were decided. At the Concordia University meet, Schuurmans once again broke the school record in the discus when he hit a throw of 58.01m (190-04).

The following day, he went to the Ward Haylett Meet hosted by Kansas State University and won the discus with a throw of 56.04m (183-10), defeating Brady Maska who participated unattached and will also compete at the USA Track & Field Championships this week.

At the NAIA Championships, he did not hit a mark he was hoping for and placed fourth in the discus. He did earn All-American honors in the shot put as well to give him a strong showing at the championship meet as Doane placed eighth as a team.

Coming off a strong season, he was encouraged by his coaches to participate in USA Track & Field regional meets with the opportunity to hit a mark that would qualify him for the national meet.

"I traveled a lot over a short time," Schuurmans recalled. "We went eight hours one day to a meet but the conditions were not good. It was extremely hot and humid with absolutely no wind and those are not good throwing conditions."

His time to qualify was quickly coming to a close. He previously fell short of the required standard by eight inches and with one weekend left, he made the trip to Aberdeen, South Dakota. He fell short on Saturday and made the trip back to Crete where Doane was hosting a qualifying meet for multi-eventers. On the final day to qualify, Schuurmans hit his throw of 59.20m (194-03) and was set to go to Oregon. He is now able to say that he has the last throw of the last event held at the discus throw area/practice football field. The following day, Doane began construction on a new athletic facility that has displaced the old discus ring.