Former Olympic sprinter Dwayne Evans coaching Arizona athlete who could break his record

When Dwayne Evans says he sees something special in a sprinter, he knows what he’s talking about. In the summer after he graduated from Phoenix South Mountain High School, Evans ran the still-standing Arizona state record of 20.22 seconds in the 200 meters at the U.S. Olympic Trials as a 17-year-old.

He went on to win the bronze medal at the 1976 Montreal Olympics — no American boy prep track and field athlete has won a medal at the Olympics since then. It’s one of the top times in high school history in the event to this day.

So, when he pulled aside a young DeMar Coleman in the eighth grade during a club track and field practice, he could tell this was a special athlete. The Do Right track club was training at South Mountain High and in that group on that summer day, Evans happened to get paired with Coleman.

Now, as a junior at South Mountain, Coleman is putting together a breakout season. His time of 21.22 in the 200 is 11th all-time in state history and he’s currently ranked second in Arizona. Coleman is starting to approach territory that his coach knows very well.

“He has no fear,” Evans said of his star athlete. “He doesn’t care who he competes against. You can beat him 10 times in a row. The 11th time, he’s coming, and he’s trying to win that time. You don’t have a mental edge with DeMar. He’ll give you the respect to say you’re fast. But he’s still trying to beat you.”

Coleman wanted to run track at a young age, but his mom, Natasha, put him in other sports first. His dad, Dontel, played football at South Mountain. So Coleman played soccer, flag football and baseball. At 7, Coleman got the chance to try out track. And he’s been doing it ever since, competing in youth track and field meets across the state.

Although Coleman has been running for a long time, the real drops in time only started to come last year. He doesn’t point to one specific turning point as what led to the breakthrough. Rather, it’s an accumulation of training for three years in the program under Evans. Things are starting to click.

“Just the hard work,” Coleman said. “I really don’t get a summer because of club track. As soon as high school is over, I go right into club. When club’s over, I have like a month or two, and then track season starts again.”

It’s all starting to add up for Coleman, who wants to start pushing times into the 20-second range. Only five athletes have ever done that before in state history, including his coach.

For Coleman, getting to learn from someone like Evans has taught him valuable life lessons.

“He’s made me better character-wise,” Coleman said. “At first, I had a really bad attitude. I didn’t want to listen to what he said. If he would tell me to do something different, I would be mad about it. I would still do it, but I wouldn’t try doing it. But over the three years, I’ve actually listened and been more open to what he has to say. Track-wise, I feel like I would’ve been fast, but not as fast without him coaching me.”

Also in that group with Do-Right on that summer day? A seventh-grader named Mayen Usoro. Evans could tell these two were different. Usoro is now running historic times as a sophomore at Laveen Cesar Chavez and is close to breaking the girl’s 200-meter state record.

It was as if Evans had a crystal ball into the future.

Now that Coleman has run 21.22, which is exactly one second off his coach’s state record, Evans has started to think about what it would mean to see it go down. Although Coleman is in his junior year, he’s the age of a sophomore. He just turned 16 in December.

Evans’ 200-meter record is officially the oldest boy’s state record in the books since North’s Dallas Long’s 1958 shot put record was broken six years ago.

“You never know how important something is until someone starts getting close to it again,” Evans said. “I’ve gotten excited. To be a part of the person that breaks the record is great. I would always say that I wanted to be at the meet when it’s broken. It’s not if, but when. So I wanted to be at the meet. But to be a part of someone that has that possibility, and it stays at home, that’s a good feeling. To be part of not just knowing him, but to give him insight to run the 200 like I was taught to, and to see him execute that, he’s close to running the perfect race.”

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: He's one of the state's greatest sprinters ever. Now he's coaching the next one