LJ wrestling: Jack Hathaway

Vikings' Jack Hathaway (top) shows his command

versus St. Augustine earlier this year.

(Photo by Ed Piper)

Interviewing junior Jack Hathaway, a wrestling co-captain at La Jolla High, is a different experience from some of the others. One, he has a unique way of expressing himself. And two, rather than being highly task-oriented and way over-booked, including tackling four or five AP courses and a business initiative combined with a service project, the 16-year-old junior openly talks about his “self-doubts” and struggles in personal interaction.

Once a scrawny 130-pound freshman who, by his own admission, had never really done anything athletic, Hathaway two years later has filled out into a 155-pounder who has gained self-confidence and who openly states: “I like myself much better than when I was in eighth grade.”

His journey into wrestling, a sweaty, grappling sport is a wonder for a young boy who disliked middle school and had few friends.

“I can’t run, I can’t throw, I can’t catch,” Jack says of his failed attempts to play football and run track. But then in a first period American Sign Language (ASL) class as a ninth-grader, he began to talk to an upperclassman, Matt Zucca, about wrestling.

 

“There wasn’t a day Matt would let me forget about wrestling.” The bigger student would physically pick Hathaway up and carry him, telling him, “You’re going to get into wrestling.”

“I’ve only had a few male role models,” the captain says: “My dad (P.J.), my godfather, and Matt--besides my coaches, Ryan Lennard and Kellen Delaney. Matt is everything a big brother should be. He was kind of a jerk, which I think a big brother should be.”

Through Zucca’s persistence, the youngster did join the Viking wrestling squad, then in its glory days. It has since had to rebuild, after losing a senior-dominated team from 2012-13. Hathaway, with co-captain Jake Harvey, is part of that rebuilding process.

Jack chuckles about losing to a wrestler who was two years younger than him when he first started wrestling. His sophomore year went a little better. After his sophomore season, Hathaway began private sessions with Lennard, then one of the wrestling coaches, now the LJHS strength and conditioning coach.

“I lifted with him Monday, Wednesday, and Friday after school. He gave me a sheet (of drills) to do on weekends. I gained 20 pounds of muscle. My bench press went up 40 pounds.
We did flexibility stuff and agility stuff. My agility has increased. (As a result) the season this year has gone great.”

He is one of the leaders in new head coach Delaney’s revamped program. More importantly than the physical dimension, the student athlete says Zucca and his other teammates have helped him grow in his social skills and view of himself. “Everything I am, I owe to wrestling. The guys have taught me to be more social. I’ve gotten older brothers. In my family, I have three sisters, no brothers.” And the clincher: “I like myself much better than when I was in eighth grade.”

The somewhat unorthodox Hathaway likes writing and is working “off and on” on a story about an eighth-grade boy who isn’t athletic and isn’t popular, who four years later has “forgotten” everything that went before and now has achieved some of his goals: he is athletic and popular. “But girls--they’re a mystery,” he shakes his head. “I have three sisters, but I have no clue about girls.”

In his newly bulked up experience, he does yoga with his mother Kayt, who grew up in her native England. His dad is a life-long La Jollan, having attended both La Jolla High and Bishop’s. His parents met here, fell in love and got married.

Somewhat unusual for a wrestler, Jack says he would like to act in a play before graduating from LJHS next year. “I haven’t been able to, because of practice and meets,” he says. He recently returned from the CIF meet in Holtville, which was an all-day event two hours away, pretty demanding on his time.

The young man also keeps a journal. “I write about my own distorted psychosis,” he says wryly. His jottings include attempts at the story about the nerdy eighth-grader who “wakes up four years later” with new-found athletic ability and being liked by people.

As far as personal likes and preferences, “a solid burger and fries” means In-N-Out and Five Guys tie for the best hamburger, in the estimation of the Clairemont resident.

His sojourn in the wrestling brotherhood means, “I definitely am not so much a pessimist as I was before. I told myself that I’m not getting better. ‘Everyone is beating me.’ I have gotten over my self-doubt.”

“One thing that people should know about me, I am the biggest pessimist. I am extremely sarcastic.”

“My freshman year, I was sad all the time. I didn’t think I could do anything. I had never excelled at anything. With wrestling, I am more confident. I can talk to people. I am much happier.”

Having been picked on in elementary school, and “some” in middle school at Muirlands, the young man would like to follow his friend and mentor Matt Zucca to Gonzaga University and study criminal justice “to get the bad guys”. “When I was a little kid, my dad would tell me how his Uncle Tony brought down the bad guys. I’d like to do something like the FBI or DEA.”

 

 

Copyright 2015 Ed Piper