University of Minnesota Athletics
Griak Hall of Fame Feature: Lefty Wright
9/15/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Cross Country
The University of Minnesota will celebrate the 30th annual Roy Griak Invitational as part of Homecoming festivities on Saturday, Sept. 26 at Les Bolstad Golf Course in Falcon Heights, Minn.
As part of the celebration, Gopher Athletics has announced the formation of the Roy Griak Invitational Hall of Fame with eight inductees slated to be honored in the inaugural class. As the Griak Invitational approaches, GopherSports.com will highlight each of the honorees including today's feature on long-timer Griak Invitational official and St. Louis Park High School coach and administrator Ralph Eugene "Lefty" Wright.
Lefty Wright's association with the Roy Griak Invitational traces its roots to the beginning of the popular meet. His association with the meet's namesake even deeper.
Wright joins Griak as a charter member of the Roy Griak Invitational Hall of Fame and the two will continue to be linked together as the meet begins to honor some of the legends who have helped transform the meet into one of the most prestigious in-season cross country meets in the nation.
Wright competed for Griak during his senior year at St. Louis Park High School and later served as an assistant coach for Griak for five years while the two worked at the school following Wright's graduation from Macalester College in 1957.
"He was a second father figure for me," Wright said of Griak, who died earlier this year at the age of 91. "He taught me a lot about organization and about handling young athletes.
"He was one of the all-time great coaches our sport has ever had and I really think he was a man ahead of his time," Wright added. "He really understood the tolerances and workload that an athlete could handle and the recovery time they needed."
Wright, competed in track and hockey while at St. Louis Park and played in the 1953 state tournament where his squad dropped its first game of the tournament to eventual state champion St. Paul Johnson in four overtimes. He later succeeded Griak at St. Louis Park when the legendary coach took over the running program at the University of Minnesota in 1963. He said he practiced many of the same principles passed down from his former mentor.
"We never did any sort of weight training," Wright recalled. "We were believers in leg lifts and push-ups and sit-ups. Our athletes dreaded workouts and really looked forward to the meets because they knew they were prepared to compete well."
After Griak became coach of the Gophers in 1963, Wright would often make the trip from suburban Minneapolis to the campus of the University of Minnesota and work for his former coach and colleague as a starter at cross country and track meets at the school.
Wright had already spent nearly 20 years working in various capacities at meets before the Roy Griak Invitational came to be a part of the landscape of collegiate cross country. By the time the meet that know bears the name of the legendary Gopher coach was first run in 1986, Wright had worked as the starter at five Big Ten outdoor track meets and at least four conference indoor meets as rules of the time prohibited starters being associated with the host institution, according to Wright, who also was the official starter at the 1990 Olympic Festival in Minneapolis.
Wright, who spent a total of 36 years at St. Louis Park, including the final 18 years as athletics director, before retiring following the 1993 season, was the official starter for nearly every Griak meet since the beginning on a cool, crisp day in 1986. He has watched as the small meet has grown from just 10 teams that first year to as many as 36 teams in 2001 and again in 2006.
"We started out having the meet on the driving range," Wright recalled. "The meet has truly turned into something special. Through Gary Wilson's ability we were able to add a high school division and the jumbotron and now the meet is the highlight of the year for thousands of runners."
Wright, and his wife, Nancy, celebrated 57 years of marriage in August of 2015.
Story by Ray Maloney
Griak Invitational Historian
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