On the Run With UCI’s Graves : He’s Juggling Life as Family Man, Medical Student, Athlete

The next time you’re stuck on the freeway, trying to get home before your family finishes dinner, imagine the kind of day Richard Graves once considered routine:

--”I worked during the day as a mason.” ( Translation : He got up at dawn and carried bricks for eight hours).

--”After work, I went for a little run.” ( Translation : Graves ran 8 to 10 miles).

--”Then I went to night classes at Long Beach City College.” ( Translation : He began preparing himself for a bio-chemistry major at UC Irvine by doing homework when most people who aren’t asleep are watching David Letterman. Then he slept for a few few hours before starting over the next morning.

Vince O’Boyle, the UCI track and field and cross-country coach, says Graves is focused.

Back then, obsessed might have been a better word.

Graves, an Irvine senior who will compete in the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. cross-country championships being held at UCI Saturday, no longer toils as a mason. But the combination of pre-medical studies and training with the Anteaters is difficult enough. Add to that the fact that Graves is married with a 9-month-old son.

Somehow, he found the time to talk about himself the other day in between a workout and a class in radioisotope techniques.

Is he looking forward to graduation and a more normal schedule?

Well, yes and no. He’s looking forward to graduating so he can go to school four more years--to become a podiatrist. And he’s looking forward to a lot more running--to become an Olympian.

Is he at least glad he doesn’t have to lug bricks for a living anymore?

Well, yes. But he’s quick to add that he’s a better person for having done it.

“After busting my butt for several months, it occurred to me that I didn’t want to do that forever,” he said. “But I learned a lot by going out there and doing it for eight hours a day, even when I thought I was too tired to move. It gave me a mental toughness I won’t forget.”

There was a time when Graves was lacking in that category.

Graves joined the track and field team in his freshman year at Lakewood High School, added cross-country as a sophomore and showed marked improvement each year. He accepted a full scholarship to UC Riverside after he graduated.

But the university’s workouts were more than he bargained for, and more than his body could handle.

“My second week at UCR, we went 100 miles,” Graves said. “I wasn’t ready for it. We ran twice a day, six days a week. The shortest runs we’d ever go on were six miles. In the afternoons, we’d go 10, 13, sometimes 14 miles.

“I improved a little in both cross-country and track. But I was so tired, I couldn’t even sleep. I was sick with colds the whole year.”

In the spring of 1984, Graves suffered a stress fracture in his hip during the conference track and field championships. He still ran fast enough to qualify for the NCAA Division II nationals in the 1,500 meters.

He took a week off and ran in the nationals.

“I didn’t make the finals, but I ran decent . . . for a guy with a fractured hip,” Graves said. “But after that, I could barely walk.

“I let everything fall apart. I stopped going to class. When you’re running, it keeps you focused. When you stop, there’s so many ways to deviate from what you should be doing. I just screwed around and the time just sort of slipped away. I gained 30 pounds, too.”

By the middle of that summer, Graves came to the realization that he had been depending too much on his running. He got a job doing masonry work and he got engaged.

Six months later, he decided to returned to school and started running again.

By the end of the spring semester at Long Beach City College, Graves was running very well again. He was being recruited by UCLA and UC Riverside (again), among others.

“I was really hesitant to recruit him because of his talent,” O’Boyle said. “I didn’t think we could afford him. I’m not in the position to get into a bidding war . . . not that he’s not worth it.”

When O’Boyle found out that Graves was more concerned with finding an apartment he could afford than getting a full scholarship, he went to work on securing a slot in UCI’s married housing development.

“Richard got some financial aid arranged, I got them into the married housing and it all fell together,” O’Boyle said. “We cemented the deal (Graves has a half-scholarship) over the phone.”

It didn’t fall together by accident. Graves was set on UCI because he believed he had finally found the right coach to help him reach his potential.

“Vince and I got along real well from the start,” Graves said. “We have the same philosophy on running and the same philosophy on life. He told me at the start he had no specific expectations, he just wanted to help me accomplish whatever it was I wanted to accomplish.

“And that’s how it’s been. If you come to him and say you’re not cutting it in a certain class, he’ll say, ‘I don’t want to see you for a couple of days. Get caught up in that class.’ ”

O’Boyle: “Richard’s 23 years old. He’s got a 3.0 GPA in bio-chemistry. He’s a great husband and super father and his family always comes first.”

Graves also is a promising young distant runner who has the second-fastest time in the 5,000 meters (13:54.99) in school history--a record O’Boyle says Graves probably will beat next spring--and the third-fastest 1,500 meters (3:45.38).

Graves finished third in last year’s Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. cross-country championships.

“I’m a little better at track than cross-country because my forte is leg speed more than strength,” he said. “But I’d like to make All-American in cross-country (one of the top 25 American finishers in the NCAA meet) and All-American in the 5,000 (top six finishers at the NCAA championships).”

Graves thinks he has a chance of qualifying for the U.S. Olympic track and field trials next summer in the 5,000 and 10,000 meters. Qualifying time in the 5,000 meters is 13:41. Even if he doesn’t, O’Boyle says he has a strong chance at making the U.S. team in 1992.

Now, however, Graves is more concerned with being accepted to the California College of Podiatric Medicine and making sure he has time to get into his radioactive protective gear in time for the radioisotope class.

Perspective. Always that perspective.