Winchester Star Boys' Track Athlete of the Year

Passion for track helps Simms deal with early end to season

June 25, 2011
By Robert Niedzwiecki
The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER- Once upon a time, James Wood junior track star John Simms thought football was going to be his primary athletic passion.

As much as he enjoyed playing for fun with his cousins as a child, that was nothing compared to his 7th grade year at Frederick County Middle School. The running back was consistently getting into the end zone, which always brought a smile to his face.

Because of pulled ligaments and torn cartilage in his right leg, the smiles didn't last long. But when he thinks about that middle school football injury now, he manages a laugh.

"I'm always getting hurt," Simms said.

Yes, the injury bug doesn't seem to want to leave Simms alone - hamstring injuries suffered at the Region II meet each of the last two years have prevented him from competing at the Group AA meet.

But when he's healthy, observers can see why track has long been his athletic passion. Who wouldn't enjoy running 100 meters that fast?

After a season in which he might have been the fastest boy in all of Group AA, Simms is The Winchester Star Boys' Track and Field Athlete of the Year. "He was stronger this year, and he was more focused and more mature," said Matt Stegmaier, James Wood's head coach and sprint coach. "He worked hard on improving, he worked hard on his starts.

"If not for that season-ending injury, he could have been No. 1 in the state."

No one in Group AA recorded a 100 time faster than the one Simms ran at the Northwestern District meet this year. He finished that race in 10.81 seconds, and he followed that up with a winning time of 10.87 at the Region II meet.

The only other people to run as fast as 10.87 were E.C. Glass's Harrison Scharf and Eastern View's Carl Lacy, who both equaled that in the state meet preliminaries before finishing 1-2 in the state meet finals with times of 11.14 and 11.16, respectively, at Harrisonburg High School.

For Simms - who tested out his injured right leg before the preliminaries before electing not to run - not being healthy enough to compete was disappointing.

But the religious Simms is not the type of person who stays down for long. From the start of his running career, he's always been grateful for what he does have, and hasn't dwelled on the things he doesn't.

"[In seventh grade], I didn't think I would be as good as I am today," Simms said.

Simms - whose mother was a sprinter in high school and whose uncle was a middle distance runner in college - has always been interested in watching people run. And after getting hurt in football, he developed a greater interest in seeing how well he could do it. In his two years running track for Frederick County Middle, he won all but one race.

After that, he made an immediate impact as a freshman at James Wood in 2009.

At the Northwestern District, he blew away the field in both the 100 (11.19, 0.33 ahead of the runner-up) and 200 (22.79, 0.53). At the Group AA state meet, he recorded his best times of the year and proved to be the fastest freshman, taking 11th in the 100 (11.08) and 14th in the 200 (22.64).

"It was unexpected and surprising," said Simms of his freshman year. "I really didn't have any plans [for that year].

"District champion was just shocking to me, and achieving that made me think how much better I'd be in the future. And even though I didn't go to finals [at the state meet], being considered the fastest freshman was a good accomplishment."

After having so much success in 2009, Simms decided to commit himself more to track, and he no longer thought about playing football. (The 5-foot-9 Simms, who hasn't played competitively since his middle school injury, has had to turn down a few invitations to play for the Colonels over the years so he could try and stay healthy for track.)

Simms' focus paid off with a strong sophomore year that saw him improve his times to 11.04 in the 100 and 22.34 in the 200. But after pulling his left hamstring at the Region II meet, his season was over.

That was frustrating, but he realized the only thing he could do was to come back his junior year with a confident attitude.

His positive outlook definitely paid off. Simms - who wowed Stegmaier with his explosion out of the blocks at the district meet - broke the Northwestern District meet record in the 100 set in 2006. The only person to break a meet record that day, Simms followed that with victories in the 200 and 400 later in the meet.

That was nothing compared to what he accomplished the following week at the Region II meet though. By winning the 100 by 0.19 seconds at a big meet, he proved he was a legitimate state-title contender.

"It was just like heaven," Simms said. "Regions is a whole different level, and to be able to compete and win on that level is just 10 times better than being a district champion."

Little did he know that he'd suffer the biggest low of his career a couple hours after his biggest high. Halfway through the 200, he pulled up after pulling his right hamstring. Clutching it, he eventually hobbled across the finish line, but he did so knowing that his season was likely over.

Considering that his chances of success at the state meet were greater than they were when he was a sophomore, this year's injury was particularly cruel.

"I wasn't upset," Simms said. "It was more like question after question, like, 'Why is this happening? How could this happen? I trained, I did everything I could, how is this even possible?'

"But at the same time, there's a purpose for everything, and everything happens for a reason. Even if you don't know that reason, things happen. Time goes on, and so must I."

Simms' religious beliefs play a large role in keeping his outlook positive. Without God and having faith, Simms said his life would have no direction.

Simms definitely thinks about life often. He loves to write, because it gives him a chance to get his emotions out, cleanse his mind, and put him at peace. It helps him focus, and if he wants to succeed on the track next year, he knows he'll have to be more focused than ever.

"[Next] year, I'm going to be strong, I'm going to be prepared, and I'm going to be the best I can be," Simms said. "If that best allows me to excel at states and win states, then so be it, and I thank God for that."

Stegmaier said he'd like nothing more than to see Simms end his career as a state champion.

"I know John's going to put in the work," Stegmaier said. "He deserves to have a great season."

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