Wilderness of Alaska helped Ram

By JAMAL THALJI

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 9, 2000

NEW PORT RICHEY -- Arigorous routine. A healthy diet. A hard-edged attitude.

All these factors and more explain why Ridgewood's Eric Dieters has been so dominant this season.

He hadn't lost a race in the 800 meters this season until the Class 3A, Region 3 meet, where he finished second. Then Dieters took fourth place at the Class 3A state meet, running it in a personal-best 1:55.15 to break his school record and earn Sunshine Athletic Conference Athlete of the Year honors.

Which is why Dieters also is the Times Pasco County Male Track and Field Athlete of the Year.

But why doesn't answer the question fully. No, the real question that begs to be asked is: where?

As in, where is it that forced Dieters to become the runner he is now?

Where is Alaska, where Dieters and his family have spent every summer of his 18 years working their fish camp on Kodiak Island.

It is an incredibly picturesque locale, a frigid, jagged land surrounded by snow-capped mountains and cool waters.

The natural, unspoiled beauty of Kodiak Island is not a forgiving territory, though.

It is a land without cable television, telephones or a mall to waste time at with friends.

What it does have is a harsh climate, a rocky, difficult running surface to negotiate and bears ... Kodiak bears that is, cousin of the grizzly and the largest carnivores on land.

Spending his summers on this island, away from the modern life of suburban New Port Richey, helped shape the person Dieters is today.

Dodging bears, running up and down steep, rocky mountains or across the harshly uneven terrain of this island while he trained helped shape the runner Dieters is now.

Ridgewood coach Glenn Cable said Dieters' upbringing in this rough, harsh land prepared him well for the rigors of running.

"This has gone on his whole life, so I think that wilderness experience is a toughening one," Cable said. "I think it kind of matured him, made him different in ways from these kids who have grown up in suburbia with Nintendo games and the little conveniences of modern life.

"I also think it gives you a lot of time to think and grow from recreation. He was building things out of logs and woods out there. He's just an unusual, unique kind of kid, very thoughtful."

And driven. Dieters said his success is the product of intensely hard work.

"The dedication, the amount of time, the training you put into it," Dieters said. "I'm out there every day, trying my hardest at practice.

"The other part is a mental game. For me, running is 50 percent running and 50 percent mental. It's how you train for a race and how badly you want it."

Training like that on the terrain of Alaska, of course, has just made Dieters that much better.

"I do a lot of mountain climbing ... for leg strength. I climb up the mountains," he said. "I'll do some (running) on the runways at a small village about 7 or 8 miles away by boat.

"It's a very hard, slow jog, hopping from one stone to the next. There's Kodiak bears there; the largest, most aggressive bears in the world. And once, this guy came from the village and told me, "Don't run up there. We saw nine bears last night."'

"It's pretty wild out there."

Indeed. Dieters' family acquires supplies by trading fish to the local cannery. Their entertainment consists mostly of watching movies on the VCR.

There's no phone, no television. Plus, they spend most of their time fishing anyway, so there is a considerable amount of work involved.

"It is pretty tough. There's not too many people and not too much stuff to do," Dieters said. "It's pretty cool. Maybe that's helped me run cross country; all the long, boring runs, being really patient."

Patient? Cable said that's not something one would associate with Dieters while he's running.

"He is an intense competitor," the coach said.

"If you had to go to war and you needed someone who was going to fight next to you, this is the kid you'd want to go."

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