By Brandon Miles
Standing six feet five inches tall and weighing two hundred and fifty pounds Brian Leonhardt stands out amongst a crowd of students. His laid back demeanor is reminiscent of a gentle giant but his skills on the football field paint a different picture. Brian earned academic all-conference in 2009 and both academic all conference and first team all conference in 2010. However, Brian is not just confined to one sport. He is also a very established track and field athlete, throwing both shot-put and discus and being all conference in both.
Originally from Spring Lake Park, Minnesota Brian was a three sport athlete in high school. Track, football and wrestling took up most of his time and if he wasn’t in a sport he could be found studying. “I was a bit of a bookworm in high school, all my friends would tease me,” he said with a chuckle “but I didn’t take offense to it because I knew they were all just kidding.”
Like all seniors in high school the next step was to figure out where to go for college. Brian’s height and size got him a lot of attention from various athletic programs for both track and football. “I got recruited hard for football by pretty much all the schools in the NSIC (Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference) and even the University of Minnesota offered me a scholarship for track.” Everyone has their own reasons and motivations for picking a school and Brian was no different. “I really thought about going to the U of M for a while but in the end I loved football and track and I wanted to continue doing both. That’s when I really started looking at Bemidji because they were one of the few schools who would let me do both sports.”
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| Leonhardt Competing in a Track Meet Picture by BSUbeavers.com |
In the spring of 2008 Brian signed at Bemidji State University as both a track and football athlete. Obviously being a student athlete is very time consuming as sports require a substantial amount of time a week. However, being in two sports leaves Brian with very little time to relax, “sometimes I get a little overwhelmed with both sports. Obviously coaches from both sports want my full commitment and it’s very seasonal.”The seasons often conflict for him, “track season starts as football season wraps up so instead of getting a month off like most guys on the team I immediately start track. Then on the other side as indoor track season ends spring football starts as well as outdoor track season so I have to balance between the two for the three weeks of spring ball.”
When Brian isn’t participating in football or track events he spends a lot of his time in the library pursuing his degree in business. “Business management has always interested me. I want to be able to make good money and be my own boss, make my own hours.” Clearly motivated and carrying a 3.76 G.P.A. he seems on his way, however, he doesn’t have everything figured out just yet. “I know I want to manage my own business but it’s not quite as simple as that. I realize that starting your own business is expensive and I’ll have to make a pretty substantial amount before I can pursue it on account of I don’t really want to take out loans to finance it.”
Although his attitude is good and his motivation is high Brian seems to be at a cross-road in his collegiate career as the BSU men’s track team was recently cut. This presents a major conflict for him as the number one reason he chose Bemidji was because of its lenience towards two-sport athletes. “As I said before the reason I chose BSU was because they allowed me to do both sports. Now one of the sports is gone and I have really contemplated transferring.” The thought of transferring has not been the easiest decision, “If this had happened freshman year it wouldn’t be that hard of a decision. But now I’ve established a really good group of friends, I have a girlfriend of almost two years now and transferring would most likely lose me credits.”
Although Brian has many decisions to make still his status as an elite athlete and good student is undeniable. Most people would crumble under such physical and mental pressure but Brian seems to handle it just fine. The future looks bright for this student athlete.
For more information on Brian Leonhardt. http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/profile.php?id=1422701101
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| Leonhardt Moves in for the Kill Shot Picture by Mary Gramm |
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