Right on Track

During a banquet for the track and field team at Reseda Cleveland High, students who compiled a grade-point average of 3.0 or better received a scholar-athlete award.

Randy Bundy didn’t get one, causing his mother, Janet, to walk out in the middle of the banquet.

When Bundy got home, his mother greeted him with a loud, firm warning.

“When you get your next progress report, it better be over 3.0 or it’s the end of your track season,” she said.

Bundy knew his mother wasn’t bluffing. And so did his friends.

“They’re scared of my mother,” he said.

Last February, Bundy accepted a football scholarship to California. On Thursday, he’ll be favored to win the 400 meters at the City Section track championships at Birmingham High. Next week, he could win the state championship.

None of his athletic or academic achievements would have been possible without the intervention and support of his mother.

“I want my mom to be happy,” Bundy said. “I feel she’s the only person I have. She loves to go to track meets. She loves going to football games. I can hear her voice over everything.”

Janet is a single parent rearing three children. She’s a social worker who drives one hour each day from Northridge to San Bernardino County. She’s also earning her master’s degree in psychology and counseling.

She has been adamant about setting high expectations for her oldest child.

“She knows what buttons to press to make me do what I have to do,” Bundy said. “Now that I think about it, it was for the best.”

It’s something for a 17-year-old finally to admit his mother is right.

Teenage life is about testing boundaries and questioning parental authority. Those who make it are the ones who eventually learn something from disagreements with their parents.

Bundy had no choice but to listen to his mother. He couldn’t make excuses because her experiences as a social worker exposed her to every trick imaginable.

“She sees a lot of stuff,” he said. “She knows all the games, everything. There’s no excuses acceptable. No matter what, she thinks, ‘Oh, you’re trying to outsmart me.’ You can come up with wild stories, but I just gave up. I get more telling her the truth than trying to make something up.”

Last summer, Bundy was ordered by his mother to take chemistry and physics in summer school to help lessen his senior class load.

“He cried all summer,” Janet said. “He didn’t want to do it. He said this was his last summer and he wanted to have fun. I told him, ‘Oh, yeah, you’re going to have some fun, but [by] going to school.’ Now his friends are struggling with mandatory classes, and he’s kicking back.”

Said Bundy: “I was arguing until the last day of summer school. Now I see a lot of people stressing out.”

Bundy has so many chores to do at home that no one in college will have to worry about him in the dorms.

He has been in charge of cleaning the bathroom, mopping the floor, washing dishes, making his bed, baby-sitting....

About the only thing he can’t do is cook.

“He burnt spaghetti,” Janet said.

Speed is what makes the 5-foot-11, 165-pound Bundy a promising football prospect. With 4.5 speed for 40 yards, he’ll be a wide receiver for the Golden Bears.

In the 400, he finished third at the City finals the last two seasons, but at Mount San Antonio College last month, he won in a career-best 47.81. The 400 is a grueling race that Bundy uses as a test of character and commitment.

“It’s like my whole body aches,” he said. “You feel it all day, the next day, all weekend. There’s not a point you can slow down. Even when you’re trying to relax, you have to run. The last 50, 75 meters is all heart.”

Bundy has learned from his mother to devote as much energy to his studies as he does his sports.

“You’re a role model whether you know it or not,” Janet told him. “You have to set yourself above the rest. If it’s common [that] athletes don’t do well in school, then you make it a point to do well. I don’t expect you to be a straight-A student, but I have to know and see you are doing everything you can do.”

Bundy doesn’t blush if someone calls him “a mama’s boy,” because he knows what his mother’s contributions have done for him.

“She’s gotten me ready for everything,” he said.

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Eric Sondheimer can be reached at eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.