Student-athlete Jeremiah Smith enters his senior year of Indoor and Outdoor Track and Field, despite the unathletic start to his high school athletic career. Smith’s start to being an athlete wasn’t easy; he initially struggled with his motivation and the physical demand of sports. He began playing football during his sophomore year and just finished his final season.

“When I first started playing football the experience wasn’t the best,” Smith said. “I got picked on because I didn’t know the basics. I was only 110 pounds so I was a lot smaller than everyone else so I faced the challenge of having to gain weight and I was a lot weaker.”

But what made Jeremiah want to start playing sports?

“It was a bet I made while sitting at lunch at the end of freshman year,” Smith said. “My friend Thomas Rick who plays football said ‘I bet you 5 dollars you won’t play football,’ and I took him up on his offer and started playing football.”

Smith wanted to improve and decided to make a change.

“I was tired of getting picked on and always messing up,” Smith said. “During the offseason sophomore year, I ran sprints outside my yard every single day to get faster. I took lifting more seriously, I wanted to get stronger and took my diet seriously.”

However, throughout the course of the football season, some teammates have questioned if Smith can use his speed on the field.

“Smith is fast but can’t do anything else. He has speed but doesn’t know how to utilize his speed well on the field”, said senior Camden Beatty, Smith’s teammate.

Jeremiah knows what critics have said about him.

“Hey man all I need is speed,” Smith said. My primary sport is track. In track it doesn’t matter how strong I am, it doesn’t matter how coordinated I am, it only matters how fast I am, so, to be honest, I don’t care what anyone says or thinks about me.”

On the contrary, some teammates have seen the improvement of Smith since he first started playing sports.

“He used to be really uncoordinated, he got made fun of but then he started working out harder his acceleration got better he became one of the fastest people on the team and in the weight room you could tell he was working on himself to get better, ” said Camden King, another of Smith’s teammates.

The 2020 indoor track season at TWHS was canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

“I was disappointed with no indoor track season last winter”, Smith said. “I worked so hard and for it to get canceled was a bummer but I’m ready this year. People have slept on my speed so I want to show them what I can do on the track and prove my haters wrong.”