Olympic gold medalist Brown Trafton seeks another title

BERLIN --- Discus thrower Stephanie Brown Trafton not only spins in the ring, She also goes about her business in a roundabout way.

First, Brown Trafton won an Olympic gold medal, becoming one of the surprise champions at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. Then in June, she won her first national title in Eugene, Ore.

And now Brown Trafton is trying to win her third major title at the IAAF World Championships in Berlin.

It might not be the typical order of events for an athlete, but Brown Trafton admitted she's anything but typical.

"I've never been the person to do things the normal way," she said. "I always seem to find an interesting and different way to accomplish my goals, but at some point they will get accomplished."

The 29-year-old from Galt, Calif., arrived in Berlin as the world leader, with four of the Top 10 throws of the season and an eight-meet winning streak. In late May, she threw 217 feet, 3 inches, a career best. 

But if Brown Trafton expected smooth sailing into the Friday's final, her body had different ideas in the qualifying round Wednesday.

"I was more nervous than I thought I was going to be physically, maybe not mentally," she said. "The nervousness starts to happen in your body first before anything else."

Brown Trafton threw 201-9 on her first attempt and did not reach the automatic qualifying distance on her subsequent two throws. That meant she had to wait until the second group of competitors finished before finding out she'd squeaked into the final as the 11th of 12 qualifiers. Teammate Aretha Hill Thurmond of Opelika, Ala., took the last spot with a fling of 200-5.

"I love being the underdog," Brown Trafton said, "and I think this may be putting me in the situation of being the underdog coming into the final."

And that's just where she wants to be.

"Like I said, I like being person who doesn't do things the normal way, so maybe scraping by into the final is just creating drama for myself," she said. "I like drama, I guess."

Brown Trafton also likes chocolate, though she had vowed to live a sweets-free life while preparing for Berlin. Her body had other ideas about that, too.

"I gave up everything for about a week and a half," Brown Trafton said. "And everything just kind of went downhill - my hormones, I don't know what was going on! But I went back to some sweets, in moderation though. I've been told that even just cutting back, my body looks different. So it's a good thing that I cut out the sweets.

"But I'm looking forward to a nice big piece of chocolate cake."

And a medal. Brown Trafton, who is 6-4, 225 pounds, has had some success using food as a motivator.

Before nationals, she cut out corn dogs, her favorite food. "My family said I wasn't allowed to eat them until I won the U.S. Championship," she said after the meet.

Brown Trafton pictured corn dogs on the field at 210 feet, and said she was "just trying to knock them down. Some people win a title and say they're going to Disneyland... I'm going to a hot dog stand. "

There are plenty of those on the grounds of Olympic Stadium, which also hosted the 1936 Olympics. Brown Trafton and her teammates are wearing a "JO" patch on their uniforms to honor Jesse Owens, whose four gold medals trumped the Nazis' theory of Aryan supremacy.

Brown Trafton said that when she walked around the stadium, "the first thing I thought about is how intimidating it was and how imposing it is with the rock and all of the columns. I can just imagine how Jesse must have felt walking into the stadium, too.

"Not only walking into this imposing stadium, but into a situation where people definitely weren't rooting for him."

She expected the same feeling of intimidation, "but at the same time, I'm going to know that the Germans love discus. I'm really excited. Most of the fan mail that I get is from Germany. I know everyone will be rooting for the discus throwers. Since I have a target on my back, I know my competitors won't be rooting for me."

The sentimental favorite, defending champion Franka Dietzsch of Germany, who was making a record 10th appearance at the World championships at age 41, did not advance to the final. Two Chinese throwers, Xuejun Ma and Aimin Song, have the top qualifying throws, with Ma's more than six feet further than Brown Trafton's.

But Brown Trafton, who placed third at the U.S. Olympic Trials to qualify for the 2008 team, believes in the power of positive thinking. At speaking engagements since winning the gold medal, she said,  "My theme is that if you have an 'I can' attitude, or attitude of success, you're going to go a lot further than if you show up and don't believe that you can win."

And she has her father wearing her lucky jacket. She picked it up at the Olympics last year after trading it with a British athlete.

"It says London 2012 on the back," Brown Trafton said. "And it's bright pink. (Her father) says, 'Do I have to wear it in public?' I said, 'No.'Just wear it, though. You can wear it sitting at home watching me on the computer.'"

Brown Trafton was the first U.S. woman to win an Olympic discus gold medal since Lillian Copeland in 1932, and in London she'll try to be the first female athlete to repeat as discus champion. For 2008, she was ranked No. 1 in the world by Track & Field News, which has dubbed her "SBT," sort of like "JJK" for Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

"It's just that I have so many syllables in my name, they want to shorten it a little bit," she said.

She has raised her profile as one of a handful of international athletes writing diaries on the IAAF Web site.

"I think the throwers are coming up in the country," said Brown Trafton, who went to college on a basketball scholarship before hurting her knee, "and I would hope that my success  would help that out and inspire other gals to get out and start being active in the sport."

She's even got her own trading card, produced by Topps Inc.

"It makes my husband happy to know that he can collect a trading card with my picture on it and save it for our future kids," Brown Trafton said. "I had no idea that the trading card fanatics would be interested in mine but it seems like they are really hot right now."

However, she hasn't quit her day job. Brown Trafton still is a supporting project manager for Sycamore Environmental Consultants, although she has flexible hours and gets the time off she needs to for practice and competitions.

"Most times," she said, "I just walk into work in my workout clothes."

Brown Trafton said before Worlds that she planned on taking only carry-on luggage to Berlin, but would leave room for a world championship medal, "just in case."

Dawn Harper, the other surprise gold medalist on the U.S. women's team, wasn't so fortunate.

After running a personal best and world-leading time of 12.48 seconds in the 100-meter hurdle semifinals, Harper clipped the second hurdle in the final. She clocked 12.81 seconds to place seventh behind teammate Virginia Powell (12.78).

"I hit it real hard and I almost fell. It's hard to regroup when you're chasing 12.51," Harper said of the winning time by Brigitte Foster-Hylton of Jamaica.

The U.S. was shut out of the medals in the 100 hurdles at Worlds for the first time since 1997.

The U.S. shutout in the discus has been even longer. Brown Trafton would be the first U.S. woman to win any medal at the World Championships in her event.

"I'm still new on the international scene," she said. "I still feel like I have something to prove."