Beyond all expectations

She walked into his office during the lunch break of her June 2008 freshman orientation and asked a question she had been mulling for a few weeks. It was a question many people would have called foolish considering the last two years of her high school career. Current junior Jennifer Zweifel asked Cochrane if she could join his track and field team although none of the Truman coaches had heard of her. It was a request John Cochrane, Truman track and field head coach said he granted with modest expectations.  

    "I was just crazy and excited for college, and I just couldn't wait," Zweifel said. "So basically I just went to them and said ‘Hey, I want to try it.' And they said, ‘OK, we're not really sure how we feel about you but you know, we'll give you a shot.' I'm really thankful that they did and that they encouraged me to stick with it."

Zweifel never intended to be a track athlete, let alone at the college level, until two months before she began school at Truman. As a high school freshman she wanted to play soccer but ran into a small problem that forever changed the course of her future: she couldn't find a ride home from practice. She was forced to join her older brother, who was on the track team, because his car was the only guaranteed passage home at the end of the day.

Seven years later, the girl who wanted to play soccer placed sixth in the nation in triple jump. Zweifel jumped 39-02.50 at the Div. II national indoor meet last month in Albuquerque, N.M., to earn All-American status.

Her efforts led her to receive Index Athlete of the year. She edged out other first place candidates sophomore swimmer Jerod Simek, sophomore volleyball and basketball player Megan Sharpe and senior golfer Jen Lawson.

Zweifel's road to All-American status and becoming one of the top 10 triple jumpers in the nation has been a journey full of unlikely circumstances. She put up lackluster numbers during her junior season of high school and

 suffered from hamstring injuries during her senior campaign.

Possibly the most surprising fact about Zweifel is that she not only went unrecruited but completely unnoticed by the university in her hometown, MIAA athletic powerhouse and Truman's arch rival Northwest Missouri State University.  

"I had already decided that I wanted to go to Truman for the academics," Zweifel said. "It was my dream school. It was–affordable. It was far enough away from home. I just did not want to stay in Maryville. Maryville is a great city, and Northwest is a great school, but I live two blocks from campus, and both my parents work at the university. Eighty-five percent of the kids who went to my high school that go to college go to Northwest, and I just needed to get away."

Getting to Truman was an early step in becoming a triple jump All-American. Zweifel currently competes in the long and triple jump but she never had competed as a triple jumper until the second semester of her freshman year. After watching Zweifel in practice, assistant track and field coach Tim Schwegler told Cochrane he thought Zweifel might have what it took to be a good triple jumper. He said the learning process would prove difficult at first.

"She was confused with the world when she was a freshman," Cochrane said. "It was just a different thing than she had gone through in high school. She was like a deer in the headlights. But the thing about her is that she tries very hard to do well. She pays attention to you. It has taken a long time for her to learn things, to learn things right."

By the spring of her sophomore year all the work had started to pay off. Zweifel qualified for the national meet but ended up jumping an inch and a half short of earning All-American honors as an underclassman. The one and a half inch barrier fed Zweifel's competitive side. It was an opportunity out of which she said she failed to get what she wanted. What she deemed failure last spring drove her to prepare harder than ever in the hope that she could achieve what she had lost in her first attempt.

The following summer, posted on the ceiling above her bed was a paper with "All-American" written on it. Zweifel has been motivating herself by posting goals on her ceiling since she was a young girl. She said competing never gets old.

"I get so hyped up when I get to compete against people of real caliber," Zweifel said.

Someone of real caliber Zweifel competed with the first two years of her career is alumna Katrina Biermann, who graduated in 2010. Biermann has the Truman pole vault record and had the triple jump record until Zweifel broke it, jumping 40-08.25 April 9 at the Central Methodist Open in Fayette, Mo.

Biermann mentored Zweifel for the better part of two years as she learned how to be an effective triple jumper. Zweifel said setting a school record was bittersweet because she loves doing well but knew the woman she was dethroning had played a great role in her success.

Zweifel said senior teammate Shaina Dotchterman and former teammate alumna Amber Clayton influenced her during her first two years at Truman.

"I'm a hurdler so I don't really get to see Jenny [Zweifel] much," Dotcherman said. "But just being a teammate and really encouraging her and always being there as support when she is competing and stuff and really just pushing her to keep on trying and do all the workouts to her full potential has really, I guess, helped her to keep it going.

Zweifel has a final year of eligibility left at Truman. Cochrane said he thinks placing better at nationals would be extremely difficult, but not impossible.

 The goals Zweifel have set are more immediate.

"Now people are like, ‘Oh, what's next?'" Zweifel said. "Forty-one feet in triple jump. That is the next mark. ... I just keep pushing the limits. I set these goals for myself, and as soon as I reach that one I set another one, and each time the goal seems so far out of reach, but bit by bit we get a little closer. Suddenly I have to set a new goal, and it is just the greatest feeling in the world."