Cross Country, Track
Favorite athlete: Herschel Walker
Favorite team: Team USA
Favorite memory competing in sports: Being a member of the Distance Medley Relay my sophomore year. I got to run with a lot of great seniors who were amazing mentors and shaped me into the person and athlete I am today.
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: When I got a flat tire running in the 4x400 meter relay at the Penn Relays and I lost my shoe!
Music on iPod: Classic Rock
Future plans: Have a large amount of land to hunt and fish on somewhere out West.
Words to live by: “Always leave something better than how you found it.”
One goal before turning 30: Spend time in different countries around the world.
One thing people don’t know about me: Despite my plans to be an engineer, I have a pretty sizeable collection of classic literature that I like to read.
By Craig Ostroff
He may have quickly become a standout on the cross country course, but as recently as two years ago, Brett Wolfinger’s autumn athletic season looked very different.
Having played football since he was five years old, Wolfinger spent the early months of his freshman and sophomore seasons at Quakertown High School not lacing up his running shoes, but strapping on the helmet and pads. Despite tipping the scales at about 155 pounds, Wolfinger lined up at center on offense and linebacker on the defensive side of the ball.
An unfortunate hit during his sophomore year ended Wolfinger’s gridiron career and led him to cross country, a sport where he quickly learned to excel.
“I remember releasing from the line to block a linebacker on a toss play, and I just remember the linebacker got real low and came up on me and hit me like a ton of bricks,” Wolfinger said of the play. “I was a little foggy, but I felt OK, so I played the rest of the game. That night, I was trying to type an essay for a class, and I noticed for spans of five minutes, I’d just stare at the screen and not type. Then I’d shake my head and think, ‘What happened?’
“I told my parents I was not feeling right. So I went to the trainer and got tested and they found out I had gotten a concussion. I have a difficult schedule in school. I don’t take it easy. And I didn’t want to risk going back to football and getting another concussion, and not being able to bounce back. So I sat out the rest of the season and supported the team.”
As difficult as it was to leave the sport he had played for more than a decade, Wolfinger said he knew that his athletic future was far more likely to come from track than football.
“I looked at the positives of the situation,” Wolfinger said. “I was able to pour all my energy into track, which was becoming my favorite sport.”
Wolfinger’s success on the track during the indoor and outdoor seasons has been incomparable. He is the school record holder in the 800 meters (1:57) and is a member of the school record-holding distance medley relay team; he qualified for State Championships during the 2013-14 indoor season in the 800 meters (and missed qualifying by one spot and 1/100th of a second in outdoor); and during his junior outdoor campaign, he won the 400 meters in every spring dual meet.
He credits a lot of that on his decision – after hanging up the football pads – to help train for the indoor and outdoor seasons by taking up cross country during the fall. While it is more common for distance runners to compete in cross country, it’s not always the case with middle distance runners.
Given the unknowns of his situation, Quakertown cross country coach Ryan Stetler wasn’t even certain that Wolfinger would compete during his junior year or if he’d simply use his time to help prepare him for the upcoming track seasons.
It didn’t take long before Stetler and the rest of the team (not to mention many opposing runners) realized that Wolfinger was not simply running cross country to get in shape – he was there to compete.
“When Brett came out last year, we had very, very specific training plan,” Stetler said. “We were unsure if he was going to compete for us last year, since he was tuning up for winter and spring seasons. But once we got into the heat of competition, there was no way Brett wasn’t racing.”
And as different as cross country was from track, Wolfinger felt the same way.
“During cross country season, I am in the cross country mindset,” he said. “I never forget that it’s training for track in winter and spring. But you can’t go into something and not give it 100 percent of your effort. If you take yourself out of the race before you step up to the line, there’s no point in being there.
“One thing that really drives me is that I don’t like to lose. That competitive spirit helps me adapt and push through it.”
His competitive spirit, focus and dedication resulted in a strong junior campaign for the Panthers. And despite this being only his second year on the team, Wolfinger was named captain for this year’s squad, where he has worked himself to be one of the top two runners on the team.
His results have proven that the trust the team bestowed upon him was not misplaced. He posted a time of 17:18 at the recent Paul Short Invitational, placed ninth at the Northampton Invitational (16:36), and 14th at the Centaur Invitational (17:16).
“On the course, Brett is one of the most intense athletes you will see,” Stetler said. “The level of concentration he has on the day of the meet is unrivaled. When he is getting ready, without saying a word, everyone else on the team knows it’s time to get ready. The leadership he provides speaks volumes. When he speaks to people, he has a non-confrontational way of inspiring people around him.”
And while cross country has helped get Wolfinger in shape for running the 400 and 800 meters during the track season, his experience in those distances also help him in cross country because when that finish line is in sight, Wolfinger has the utmost confidence that he will have the speed and stamina remaining to pull away from anyone who might happen to be in his path.
“When I put the hammer down, I don’t take anything from anyone in the last couple hundred meters,” he said. “Even if the race has taken a lot out of me, I know I have that extra gear and that little flicker of fight to run down the guy in front or break away from the person next to me.”
Or, as Stetler succinctly puts it: “If you’re in the last 400 or 800 meters, you don’t want to look to your side and see Brett.”
For Wolfinger, being a captain means providing an example for his teammates, but also helping to ensure that he helps make the student-athletes who follow him – and the program itself – better.
“I’ve always believed that you should leave something better than the way you found it, especially if you’re a captain of a sports team,” he said. “To be named captain for cross country, I was really excited to be able to take that role and apply that mantra to it. Our team right now is pretty young. We have a lot of stellar young kids. I’ve been given a great opportunity to captain that team and help those kids grow as runners. And when I’m in college, I’m excited that I’ll be able to call or text, or just look back and see the great things they’re doing.”
The desire to leave his mark has inspired Wolfinger to undertake numerous endeavors to help improve his school and his community. He serves as a student representative to the Board of School Directors to the Quakertown Community School District, an Executive Cabinet member to the Class Council, and was a student founder of the Math and Writing Labs at Quakertown High School.
It’s that motto to always leave things better than you found it that drives Wolfinger.
“That quote is from my dad, actually, but it’s always stuck with me,” Wolfinger said. “If everyone lived by that code, think of how great things would be. It’s a shame when people don’t give much of a hoot to what happens to the next person. It’s all about helping people, making things better.”
Helping out means everything from tutoring a classmate in the Math Lab, providing a presentation to the school board, or even something as simple as being a good student and citizen and taking an interest in the people around him during the school day. Wolfinger, who holds a 4.275 GPA, takes six Advanced Placement classes and is dedicated to putting in the proper hours for homework and study. His commitment has resulted in stellar scores in the SATs (2290 out of 2400) and ACTs (35 out of 36) as well as being inducted into the National Honor Society.
“I try to tell all of the guys on our team all the time, if you take care of the things you need to take care of in the classroom, it’ll take care of you,” he said. “I’ve met a ton of amazing people from being in AP classes, a lot of great people with a lot of different skills and I’ve met a lot of great teachers and built a lot of great relationships. When you put forth the effort, school opens so many doors for you.
“People have asked me, ‘Why do you study so much? Do you ever have any fun?’ But if I don’t put in all the work I do, I wouldn’t have the opportunities I do now. I try to impart that on other people. It opens up doors. And there’s still going to be time to have fun and hang with your friends as well.”
Wolfinger has an additional source of inspiration that drives him to be the best athlete, student, and citizen he can be. When Wolfinger was a freshman, his older half-brother, Nick Umberger, was killed in a car accident. Though they were nine years apart in age, the two were very close, Wolfinger said, and Nick is never far from his thoughts.
“What happened to Nick has really been instrumental in my life,” he said. “If that hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t be where I am right now. I feel like I am living for two people. That’s why I feel like I always have to give more than 100 percent; I feel like all my experiences are for me and for him. It’s something I keep in the back of my mind.”
It all adds up to make Wolfinger one of the most well-rounded, down-to-earth, and respected individuals in the school.
“I’ve coached a handful of athletes close to Brett’s caliber as far as accolades and what he’s accomplished in athletics,” Stetler said. “But what he does in the classroom is unmatched. I’ve never met a person who’s more well-rounded than Brett.
“Brett is really just a high-caliber character guy. He’s humble, despite all the accolades he’s achieved. He takes his accomplishments very seriously and he doesn’t take them for granted. And it’s rare to see someone so universally respected as he is. Everyone in school knows Brett, everybody respects him.”
Next year, Wolfinger is looking to take his talents to Johns Hopkins University, where he plans on entering the school’s prestigious Biomedical Engineering Program and running track. Though he has not yet been officially accepted into the school or the program, Wolfinger remains confident that it’s only a matter of time.
“Their Biomed Engineering program is No. 1 in the county, if not the world,” Wolfinger said. “I’m really excited to see what comes out of it.”
For now, however, Wolfinger has some unfinished business to take care of on the cross country course and during the indoor and outdoor track seasons.
“In cross country, I want to try to qualify for States,” he said. “For the indoor season, I want to get back to states, and I’d love to bring home some hardware. I want to re-break my indoor record, set it lower, though probably won’t stand for long. It’ll be nice to have for a year or two.
“In outdoor track, I want to make States. I missed it by 1/100th of second last year – that was one of the worst things ever. This year, I want to make it beyond a doubt that I’m there. Another medal and an outdoor school record would be great.
“And when I graduate, maybe to have some of the guys say, ‘I wish you weren’t leaving. We’re going to miss you.’ That would be cool to know you’ve had an effect on someone, to have someone say something like that.”
