FROM THE CHEAP SEATS: Prep cross country legend now a movie

Venerable Petaluma High School track coach Doug Johnson chided me recently for knowing very little about the sport of cross country. The architect of a strong Trojan program began to cite winning times and great seasons of the past.

In an effort to fire off an intelligent comeback, I countered by saying, “Just one minute here. I know all about the McFarland runners.” It caught his attention and I regained a measure of respect. Johnson, too, recalled some of the exploits of the Cougar cross country team.

Most of my updated information came during a conversation with a former basketball coaching adversary of mine who I visited with at the West Coast Jamboree this year. The coach from neighboring Corcoran was lamenting on the unfairness of the CIF in his section in placing his team in a higher division because of their continued success. McFarland came up in the conversation because the same thing happened to its storied cross country program after the Cougars won the section and state title for an astounding ninth time.

The basketball coach mentioned an upcoming film about the McFarland runners that Disney was making starring Kevin Costner, and the stir it created in the little town when the film star and crew came to the high school. It is currently playing in several Sonoma County theaters - including Boulevard 14 Cinemas in Petaluma - under the title “McFarland USA.”

McFarland is a small farming community on the Highway 99 corridor between Delano and Bakersfield. The roots of the town originally came from the Dust Bowl migration in the 1930s, but in recent years it has become a migrant town made up almost entirely of Hispanic farm workers. When the final vineyard in the area has been harvested, the unemployment rate in town quickly increases by more than 30 percent.

Because there are not any Division V schools in the immediate area, McFarland was placed in our league in the Central Valley during the 1980s and 1990s, despite the fact that most of the schools were separated by 90 miles or more.

It was a long bus ride for all of us, but victories generally accompanied the trip. McFarland was usually easy pickings. That is unless you overlook cross country and track and field. Season after season, our teams took their annual beating at the hands of the well-drilled Cougar runners.

What I did know was that the track coach at our small school had to help lay out the league cross country course at local parks for the championships each season. Distances have to be measured, and often the courses are run through very scenic areas. The only thing was that everybody ran for second place when the McFarland bus rolled in.

McFarland’s rise to the top of the charts came when a young teacher by the name of Jim White came aboard. In an effort to inspire his high school students, White convinced potential athletes at the school to try cross country because he believed that they could succeed with the hard work ethic that accompanies championship-caliber sports. It didn’t hurt that he spotted some terrific potential in some of the prep runners in the area.

It took some doing because many of the skeptical and untested runners had field work responsibilities and some didn’t even have the money for proper athletic shoes. The story about the challenged McFarland runners appeared in an article in the Los Angeles Times which was accompanied by photos of early morning Cougar workouts in orchards where they worked by day.

White gradually won their trust, and one Hispanic runner grinned as he claimed later, “White ain’t white, he’s a Mexican.” Runners at McFarland began to run each season for the approval of their coach, the pride of the community and their family heritage. The results of their passion for running showed big time with each successful season.

Winning the Central Section title was one thing, but beating the private small-school recruiting machines on the state level was another. Season after season, the Cougars beat them all.

Until then, McFarland High School had only been known in the area for having toxic drinking water near the campus, and the tragic loss of football player Freddie Mendoza, who died following a collision on the playing field.

The movie, starring Costner and Maria Bello, previewed in select theaters today and is opening on Friday, and it is my hope that it is inspirational and done well. Costner, who has crafted a career playing numerous sports figures, has the personality to make it credible playing the dedicated White. The screenplay for the movie was based on an article in the LA Times “Poor Farm Town Races for Success.”

It will be up to viewers and critics to rate the movie, but I hope it is worthy.

Go Cougars. Maybe your recent placement in Division I competing against schools with enrollments of more than 2,000 students makes sense to somebody.

(George Haire is a sports contributor to the Argus-Courier and a former high school coach and athletic director. He can be reached at johnie.jackson@arguscourier.com)