There’s New Look and New Joy in Life for Brisco-Hooks

Valerie Brisco-Hooks, of three-gold-medal fame, has arrived fashionably late for an interview. The parking-lot attendants at UCLA, where she works out daily, kept telling her where she couldn’t park.

She rode on a prize-winning float in the Rose Parade, but hardly anybody recognized her because she has a new hairstyle--no braids--and she was wearing a Girl Scout uniform.

She didn’t make the top 10 on the U.S. Track and Field News list of the year’s outstanding female track and field athletes.

Endorsements and commercial offers have not been pouring in.

She, her husband, Alvin, and son, Alvin Jr., still live with Valerie’s mom in South Central L.A. While Valerie was passing through New York City not long ago, one of her gold medals was stolen.

Hard times for Valerie Brisco-Hooks?

Hardly.

If Brisco-Hooks were any happier, she could rent her smile to Mary Lou Retton.

“She has an amazing attitude,” says Bob Kersee, Valerie’s coach. “Nothing seems to bother her. She’s carefree, happy.”

Maybe that’s because Brisco-Hooks remembers times that weren’t so good, before she discovered running, and vice versa.

“When I got to Locke (High School, in Watts), I was bad,” Valerie says. “In junior high I didn’t go to class, I fought a lot, I was suspended all the time. In a month, I would go to school a total of maybe a week and a half. I fought all the time. Growing up, I was skinny and everyone used to mess with me. I hung out with my brothers, and I thought I was bad. I fought a lot of guys.”

She was tough. She was about to discover she was also fast. Early in her freshman year at Locke, in 1976, Valerie was paired off with the fastest girl in the school in a race that was part of physical agility tests in her physical education class.

“I was nervous and scared, but I beat her,” Brisco-Hooks said.

Valerie went out for the track team.

“I started winning. You like winning, right? It really changed my life a lot.”

In order to run, she had to attend classes, get passing grades and stay out of fights. She gave it a try. It was fun. She liked the new way better. She got un-lazy, learned to work hard.

Her running kept her in school, helped send her to college, where she met her future husband, and, of course, carried her to Olympic fame.

The end?

No, the beginning.

Brisco-Hooks came on so quickly last summer, seemingly from out of nowhere, that some in the track world probably considered her three-gold performance--at 200 meters, 400 meters and in the 1,600-meter relay--a surprise, maybe even a fluke.

After all, she had had a baby in 1982, and in ’83 Brisco-Hooks was only 13th on the American women’s 200-meter list and nowhere in the top 50 on the 400-meter list. At the Olympics, she set American records in both events.

Also, because of the Eastern Bloc boycott, Brisco-Hooks still must prove herself to the other half of the world.

“Valerie told me they (fans, and Eastern European runners) won’t believe what she did in ‘84,” Kersee says. “People weren’t expecting her to win. She’s still got more to do, more stepping stones in life.”

Brisco-Hooks and Kersee figure that a world record or two this year will earn her some respect and solidify her global reputation, maybe even earn her some endorsement offers. After all, she’s young, pretty, outgoing, seemingly a model mother and citizen, and she did win three gold medals.

“I believe Valerie’s been overlooked,” Kersee says. “I am highly upset that she has not been recognized. She’s a valuable, positive figure, willing to share her love.”

Valerie lets Kersee do the griping. She does the running. If three golds aren’t enough for the world, she’ll work for more. The ’85 season will begin for her Jan. 18 in the Sunkist Invitational at the Sports Arena.

In the meantime, Brisco-Hooks is still very visible back in her old neighborhood. She visited her grammar school, giving a speech and answering questions, and last month she was inducted into Locke High School’s new hall of fame.

“I still meet people who say, ‘I saw you on TV,’ ” she said. “One little boy brought his mother to the house and said, ‘See, Mama, I told you she lives over there.’

“I enjoy that, being around kids. They see that I’m not into drugs or any of that stuff. They say, ‘I’m gonna run track.’ It’s good that they see something positive, it makes me feel good. If there’s a person they can look up to, they might want to change, be like that person.

“I don’t want anybody to grow up and be bad. I don’t like to see people doing nothing with themselves. If I can help motivate them, even if it’s not in sports . . . “