Work, Talent Put Oettinger on Easy Street : Preps: By exploring all avenues, Foothill High track star has maintained plenty of options in life.

Don’t think for one minute Tara Oettinger has placed all her eggs in one basket. In fact, she could probably use a few more baskets.

She’s an accomplished pianist, an outstanding student (4.4 grade-point average on a 4.0 scale), and one of the county’s finest all-around track and field talents.

Oettinger, a junior at Foothill High, has found the roads to success pretty easy, no matter where they’ve taken her.

“She definitely has her priorities straightened out,” said Jerry Whitaker, Foothill track and field coach. “She’s a pretty academic kid and is very bright.”

Added the Knights’ long jump coach, Les Berman: “I don’t know whether it’s her intelligence or not, but she learns awfully quickly.”

Most athletes who dominate a sport the way Oettinger does usually live and breathe it. Not Oettinger, who aspires to a career in pediatrics.

“I like track a lot, but I don’t know if I will do it in college,” said Oettinger. “I don’t want anything to get in the way of me becoming a doctor.”

Oettinger has already made strides toward her goal, serving as a nurse’s assistant for four hours every Sunday afternoon at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana.

“It would be a shame for her not to compete in college, because she is just blossoming on the track and will only get better,” Whitaker said of his star pupil, who has expressed an interest in staying in California to attend school.

Staying close to home has been a comfort Oettinger has enjoyed recently, as track and field has given the 5-foot-8 speedster an opportunity to travel abroad.

Oettinger’s talents helped land her a spot as a sprinter and jumper last summer in the Maccabia Games in Israel, where she joined current Foothill teammate Ethan Taub in representing the United States.

After third-place finishes in the 100- and 200-meter races, Oettinger ran legs on the 400- and 1,600-meter relay teams, which finished second.

Oettinger, the defending Century League long-jump champion and Southern Section finalist, also landed a then-personal best in the event, leaping 18-6 for fifth place.

“Ethan had done some things athletically before then,” Whitaker said. “But that trip just did wonders for Tara’s confidence. She got couple of medals and came back really fired up about track.”

A training regimen of plyometrics with boxes (jumping over or upon boxes of various heights) and bounding has helped make the junior a legitimate contender for the State long jump title.

“I was really scared of the boxes at first,” Oettinger said, “but it is really helping me get stronger.”

Her newfound strength has helped Oettinger put together an active streak of four consecutive weeks jumping in excess of 18 feet, including rounding up an Orange County Championships title, an undefeated league dual-meet season and a fourth-place finish in the Arcadia Invitational. The latter produced a mark of 18-11 3/4, a personal best and the eighth-best prep mark in the nation at the time.

Not bad for someone who just got serious about jumping last summer.

“I’ve improved a lot with my consistency,” said Oettinger, who holds the county’s ninth-best mark. “I just listen to Les because I know it will be right.”

“I’ve really enjoyed working with her,” said Berman, an ex-national team coach who also headed the Long Beach State program. “I would think before she graduates that she will be a 20-footer.”

Lisa Gourdine of El Toro set the county’s top mark with a jump of 19-9 in 1977.

Although prowess in the long jump is bringing her the greatest accolades this season, Oettinger hopes to make her mark on the track, too.

She has the county’s best time this season in the 100 (11.9 seconds) and 200 meters (24.8), but everybody seems to believe she can do better.

“Tara has a fairly poor start, which tends to limit her in the 100,” Whitaker said. “But her speed can more than make up for that in the 200.”

Whitaker said Oettinger’s future might lie in the 400.

“I want to make it to State in the 200,” she said. “But I would really have to get my time down.”