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Q&A with Brandon Lewis, Jumps, Senior

Meet Brandon Lewis

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I know you’re from Bismarck, did you always want to go to NDSU?

Well, right away, I didn’t really think I would be in collegiate track at all. Going into my junior year of high school, it wasn’t in the back of my mind at all. It wasn’t until my senior year that schools began contacting me, but none of the big schools talked to me so I thought, ‘let’s go compete for the hometown team.’

 

What was your goal in high school?

Like I said, it wasn’t really track until my senior year. I knew I wanted to go into architecture. That’s long gone, but at the time, I knew NDSU had a good architecture program. It wasn’t until my senior year when the number one sprinter, at the time, in the state of North Dakota, who is one of my friends, told me I could probably go Division I if I had a breakout year.

So, on your bio online, it says you’re an exercise science major, but you told me you’re phy ed major. What is the deal with that?

So, I was an exercise science major the first semester of my freshman year, and switched to PE and health sciences and just didn’t tell anyone in the athletic department. We actually did the senior awards banquet and Matt Larsen announced me as an exercise science graduate. It made me giggle a little bit.

So, what do you want to do with that? Are you trying to go the teaching route?

Going the teaching route is actually plan C as weird as that sounds. Plan A is to try and have a short pro career. My body is breaking down, but I’d like to at least have a short pro career and then get into coaching. I want Coach Pritchard’s job. I don’t want his because he deserves this but I want to do what he does at a different school. Plan B would be to try and get a coaching job right away or teach and work my way up to a collegiate coaching job.

What interests you about coaching?

It’s a lot different than teaching, but it’s also kind of the same. One of my favorite things to do is to see the athletes grow. We have certain camps that we host during the summer and even in that one week span, when you’re coaching, the transformation with the kids is amazing. And the biggest thing for being a coach is not only coaching the athlete to be a better athlete, but also to be a better person. Seeing that character growth and character development, is really exciting.

As a prospective future coach, do you consider yourself a student of the events? Do you try to dive into books or anything to learn more about the technique?

I probably don’t read as much about it as I should, but having a full-time teaching job at the moment and being an athlete and then having 12 credits in grad school on top of all of that, I get a little busy. But one thing I’ve tried to do with grad school is I’ve tried to make every project or assignment based on coaching. For example, one of my projects that I’m working on now we have to try to find an issue with something that we want to do. I want to research more about how to stop overcoaching. Sometimes, when I’m teaching someone, I have an issue with going into every single detail of every single thing rather than just saying, ‘try this one thing.’

What are you passionate about outside of track & field?

I love video games. Over the past few years, my favorite has been Apex legends. I absolutely love it. It frustrates the living crap out of me but that’s fine. Recently, Call of Duty dropped so I’ve been playing that as well. But sometimes, you got to stick with the OG and just go with Minecraft. You’ve got to do it. Like I said, I was into architecture. I majored in it my first three days on campus.

I’m also an avid golfer. I love golfing. I think I did over 30 rounds this last summer.

Where is your favorite course?

Rose Creek is beautiful.

Accomplishments

2017-2018

Indoor:

  • 3rd place in the long jump (Summit League Championships)
  • Jumped the 5th longest long jump in school history (24-04.50)
  • 8th in the 60m (Summit League Championships)

2018-2019

Indoor:

  • 2nd in the long jump (Summit League Championships) Outdoor:
  • 3rd in the long jump (Summit League Championships)
  • 2nd in the 4x100m relay (Summit League Championships)
  • NCAA West Preliminary Rounds qualifier in the long jump
  • Tied for the 5th longest long jump in school history (24-07.75)

2020-2021

Indoor:

  • 1st in the long jump (Summit League Championships)
  • 1st in the triple jump (Summit League Championships)
  • Jumped the 4th longest long jump in school history (24-06.50)

Outdoor:

  • 1st in the long jump (Summit League Championships)(2nd longest in school history 25- 06.00)
  • 9th in the triple jump (Summit League Championships)
  • NCAA West Preliminary Rounds qualifier in the long jump

2021-2022

Indoor:

  • 1st in the long jump (Summit League Championships)
  • 2nd in the triple jump (Summit League Championships)
  • Broke the NDSU indoor long jump school record and set a new NDSU facility record while posting the 37th best mark in the NCAA on the year (25- 01.75)

Outdoor:

  • 1st in the long jump (Summit League Championships)
  • NCAA West Preliminary Rounds qualifier in the long jump
Q&A with Brandon Lewis, Jumps, Senior
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