UC IRVINE NOTEBOOK / ROBYN NORWOOD : Morales Seeks a Three-Peat at Meet

Mike Morales has a knack for throwing objects of all sorts--the discus, the shotput and the hammer. He will throw them all in the Big West Conference track and field championships at Las Vegas this weekend.

And afterward, he has in mind a final chuck of the discus, of which he has grown tired.

“I’ve been looking forward to getting rid of the discus,” Morales said. “I’ll go throw all those in the lake, I tell myself.”

Before he has done that, however, he hopes to have thrown the discus farther than anyone else at the meet--and the same goes for the shot and the hammer, his specialty. Morales will be going for a rare triple, trying to win all three events.

“I don’t think it’s ever been done,” Morales said. He’s right. Others have won Big West titles in two of the three events in past years--including Utah State’s Craig Carter, who beat Morales in the discus and hammer last year. But no one has won all three in the 20-year history of the conference championships.

“It’s not like winning the 100, the 200 and the 4 x 100 (relay) because you’re fast,” Morales said. “These are completely different even though they’re all throwing. They’re so remarkably different.”

They are so different, and training for all three can be so counterproductive, that Morales catches it from all ends. Discus coaches advise him to quit the hammer; his hammer coach tells him to quit throwing the discus.

“They don’t mesh very well,” Morales said. “On the shot, I slide. The disc is one turn, the hammer is four.”

Even his mind and body have occasionally reminded him that trying to do so much may be too much.

Once, after competing in the hammer, Morales began warming up for the discus.

“I freaked out and did a hammer turn, just in warm-up,” he said. “It was kind of embarrassing.”

Morales came to Irvine as a discus thrower from Garden Grove High School, where he also had competed in the shot. His specialty was to be the discus. “Or so we all thought,” Morales said. But it has been the hammer at which he has excelled, after idly picking it up and teaching himself to throw it.

His throw of 212 feet this season is the top mark in the conference. His shot mark of 56-4 3/4 is also the best, and Morales is the defending Big West champion.

In the discus, he is second to Utah State’s Roger Daley, whom he has beaten twice.

“That’s my least favorite,” Morales said. “I can’t practice it very much or I go crazy.”

The discus, to his thinking, will be the most difficult to win of the three. The other two he all but guarantees.

“Unquestionably, I’ll win the shot, definitely,” Morales said. “The hammer is almost as sure as the shot, although sometimes goofy things happen in that event. Last year I should have won, but I ended up only third.

“Last year, Craig Carter took (the hammer) from me,” Morales said. “This year was going to be revenge. But he redshirted, that dog.”

Having already qualified for the NCAA championships May 30-June 2 at Duke University in Durham, N.C., where he is seeded third, Morales is still drawing out his training, intending to peak later.

“I try to peak in the discus and the shot for Big West. The hammer I don’t plan to throw real far, just far enough to win.”

After the NCAA championships, Morales’ career at Irvine will be over. He says he plans to continue competing in the shot and the hammer, with an eye on trying to make the U.S. Olympic team as a hammer thrower in 1992 or 1996.

Morales figures that process will include beefing up from around 215 pounds to 230 or 240, and perhaps seeking out more coaching.

“I’m not tapped out physically,” he said. “I have a lot of potential, a lot of room for improvement. A lot of guys are really strong already, and I’m right up there with them already.”

Greg Patton and his tennis team are awaiting word on whether they make the NCAA tennis championships, which begin May 18 at Indian Wells. Selections will be made during a conference call today, and are to be announced Friday.

Irvine is on the bubble in the team selections, but Trevor Kronemann and Richard Lubner are expected to compete in the individual championships.

Anteater Notes

Kaia Hedlund, associate athletic director for student affairs, has accepted a position at the University of Hawaii, where she will be an assistant athletic director for student services. . . . Steve Florentine, a junior middle blocker and hitter and one-time Anteater basketball player, was a third-team all-Western Intercollegiate Volleyball Assn. selection.