BuddyMartinBlog: TheOcalaTrio Steals The Show Just As We’re About To Hit Boring Part Of February

Brittany Bowe started it: #TheOcalaTrio epicenter of speedskating. (USOlympic Photo)

Huh? Ocala? Speed skating? The closest ice rink is 100 miles away! So they found a roller-skating rink less than a mile from my house where they crafted their championship on training wheels instead of blades.

In the life of a columnist/editor and five-or-six -times a week talk show guy, you never get to take a beat. But February can be Death By Boredom for a sportswriter. Once asked why he quit this business, a famous journalist/playright allegedly said, “February.”

It’s amazing how we find ways to keep going in life, let alone in the adult sandbox of sports after the Super Bowl. For me, it’s the power of the story.

Pardon my self-indulgence today, but as I take up the challenging question of “Is There Life After Football?,” I must confess this has been a more interesting February than usual around here.

Today I choose not to tackle the perpetual orange and blue hues and cries of “Fire Mike White,” or “Take The ‘Interim’ Off Of Kelly Rae Finley” or even “Will Anthony Richardson Win The Heisman – Or Even The Starting Job?”

This week I found my ultimate-underdog-overcoming-hometown story right under my nose, inspired by the people and events surrounding Ocala, where I was born, grew up and spent most of my adult life. I am especially suckered in by the themes of underdogs overcoming their odds.

I also love my hometown. Ocala is a little jewel of North Central Florida, where BTW, the University of Florida first took root as East Florida Seminary in 1853. It was known for its commerce and as a small cosmopolitan community at the turn of the 20th century and eventually became the “Horse Capital Of The World.”

Ocala's Joey Mantia leading the way for a bronze medal. (US Olympic Photo)

Suddenly in a matter of a few days, Ocala has grabbed the international spotlight as a hotbed of Olympic speed skating with the remarkable story of three medalists who grew up here and trained as inline roller-skaters.

Huh? Ocala? Speed skating? The closest ice rink is 100 miles away! So they found an inline roller-skating rink less than a mile from my house where they crafted their championship training on wheels instead of blades. That’s like swimmers from the Sahara Desert diving in the sand and winning Olympic medals!

This story will go down in history as an epic tale of how these three skaters and a grandmother/coach overcame impossible odds to achieve international fame without resources or even a venue. I hope Hollywood scriptwriters have been paying attention.

I can’t possibly write it any better than the Associated Press’s Paul Newberry did after Bowe won the Ocala Trio’s third medal.

How Ocala Became The Birthplace Of Olympic Speed Skating

Brittany Bowe.

Erin Jackson.

Joey Mantia.

All three are among the world’s best skaters and leading medal contenders at the Games, but that’s not what draws your attention.

It’s the hometown beside each name: Ocala, about 100 miles north of Tampa, better known for producing some of the fastest thoroughbreds on the planet, earning the moniker “Horse Capital of the World.”

“We have fast horses,” (their coach) Renee Hildebrand bragged, “AND fast skaters.”

Hildebrand deserves much of the credit for transforming Ocala into the epicenter of the U.S. speed skating world. Just don’t go looking for the ice-skating rink. Ocala doesn’t have one.

The amazing story of Erin Jackson, Winter Olympic gold medal winner. (USOlympic Photo)

By mid-week, the Ocala Trio had snared its third medal (bronze) as Bowe won her first individual honor in her third Winter Olympics try. That followed a team bronze won by Mantia in the men’s pursuit.

In a dramatic moment earlier, Jackson won the gold medal for 500 meters, an event she was allowed to compete in after failing to qualify only because her friend, teammate and training partner Bowe agreed to give up her spot (but later got it back).

Jackson became the first black woman to win a medal in speed skating. After taking the podium with a stoic face, Erin burst out in tears mid-Star-Spangle Banner when she realized the full impact of her accomplishment. Most of us also had wet eyes.

A product of Ocala’s Howard Middle School and Forest High School, Erin was an honors graduate in Materials Science & Engineering at the University of Florida who took up the sport at 25 and won the gold before she turned 30.

Who among us can’t get behind such a story?

And that’s not all I want to brag about concerning Ocala. As the Gator baseball team kicks off the 2022 season, it will rely heavily on three Marion County sluggers to carry them to what they hope will be a return to Omaha. (As written about on these pages elsewhere by GatorBait intern Kyle Curtis).

Jud Fabian came back to make it three in #TheOcalaPowerCompany. (UAA Photo)

The Fabian brothers, Deric and Jud, join fellow Ocalan Sterlin Thompson as Kevin O’Sullivan’s main sluggers on what he hopes will be a baseball team bound for Wichita again.

Ah, just five weeks out from spring where we can enjoy the diversion of MLB and the PGA Tour for a bit. Wait! Baseball is still on strike? And The PGA Tour is about to have defectors to Saudi Arabia? OK, let’s get through the rest of February first and we’ll get around to that. Or maybe we won’t.