Andrew Rhoades: From Novice to All All-American.


In a matter of weeks, Andrew Rhoades  went from a novice at the decathlon to an AAU Junior Olympic All-American.

Rhoades took eighth place in the 15-16 year old division earlier this month in Humble, Texas, a whirlwind span that started thanks to an idea by his club coach Danny Butterfield, who runs the Pony Express Track Club.

A sprinter at Princeton, a Class 1 school located off Interstate 35 near the Iowa-Missouri border, he thought his best chance to reach the national meet was to try something different - well many different events.

The junior-to-be went to a qualifying meet in Hays, Kansas, and on the long drive back he thought his best shot was to do something different.

Two weeks before going to Bentonville, Arkansas for another qualifying event, Rhoades and Butterfield got to work on learning enough of each of the events to be successful.

"I just noticed he has a huge ability in whatever I tossed at him and with the decathlon being 10 events, I thought he would be a good fit," Butterfield said. "He is athletic. He's hard working and he adapts to new techniques really fast."

When Rhoades first arrived at the Faucett-based track club, he was a cross country runner.

He quickly turned his focus to sprints, though his cross country experience paid off during the trip to Texas. More on that later.

Rhoades specialized in the 100-, 200- and 400-meter dashes and had one of the top qualifying times in the state. His first trip to Jefferson City in May ended with a pair of all-state medals in the 4x200 (sixth) and 4x400 (fifth) and qualifying in the 200- and 400-dashes.

Some of the decathlon events were a little easier than others. Rhoades didn't have issues with the 400 and 1,500-meter run and caught onto the javelin early on.

Pole vault, discus and hurdles provided a challenge for him.

"Several of the events he learned you can't get good in a few weeks," Butterfield said. "It is crazy he got there. Pole vault and javelin is the hardest and shot put and discus is a new experience ... a crazy new experience. He is small-framed but he isn't just very, very fast. He has a lot of power for his size."

There were events that Rhoades did well in, starting with a second-place showing in the 400. He added a fifth in the javelin and high jump, eighth in long jump and ninth in the 100.

The 400 was the final event on day one and he pushed through with a 52.38.

Rhoades' parents were taping each event and texting it to Butterfield to get some coaching advice from Missouri.

Going into the last event, the 1,500, Rhoades sat in ninth place.

"I was honestly going into the meet, I was ranked ninth but I was hoping for a top eight but I was just unsure if I could get a better score, but I was hoping for top eight," Rhoades said.

Rhoades was trailing by 40 points from the eighth-place spot.

Butterfield did some quick math and told his parents he had to beat Josh Sanders, from Severn, Maryland, in the race.

He did it, running a new personal best 4:51.99, taking fifth place. It was more than 10 seconds better than his previous best time.

"I just went out to have fun," Rhoades said. "When I realized I had a shot to place, I got excited. The javelin and long jump surprised me a little, but the 1,500 ... I was not expecting that."