SDSU’s Burrell relishes her track & field life
Rio Grande grad still comes back to Duke City several times a year
Can’t go home again, huh? Don’t try telling that to San Diego State track coach Shelia Burrell, who was back in her native Albuquerque for this weekend’s Mountain West Conference Track & Field Championships. Burrell gets home regularly. Then again, her heart has never left.
“I come here often,” she said after Friday’s competition at the Albuquerque Convention Center. “I come at least once or twice a year for this (track & field), and come for family a lot. My whole family lives here, grandparents, mom, aunts, uncle. We’re very close, and I love coming back.”
Besides family, the former two-time Olympian has one other basic Burque priority.
“It’s a special feeling eating green chile stew,” she said with a smile. “The first thing I do when I get into town is go to Frontier (Restaurant), get some green chile stew — a No. 6 — and I’m good to go.”
Burrell has been good to go her entire life — as a youngster growing up in the South Valley, as a three-sport superstar at Rio Grande High, as a track & field sensation at UCLA and as a member of the United States Olympic teams in 2000 in Sydney and 2004 in Athens.
She finished fourth in the heptathlon in Athens, was a bronze medalist in the heptathlon at the 2001 Edmonton World Championships and is a five-time national champion in the event.
Burrell coached two years at Georgetown University before becoming head coach at SDSU, where she is in her sixth season.
“I’ve known her since I got into the league,” said UNM coach Joe Franklin. “First of all, she’s a great person. She’s funny; she’s competitive in a good way. And most of the coaches I’m aware of around the country, all have a great relationship with her. She’s really good people.”
Burrell graduated from Rio Grande in 1990 and had to make a decision about which sport to pursue. She led the state in rebounding and scoring in basketball and was AllState in hoops, volleyball and track & field. She chose UCLA and track & field.
“Playing three sports made me a better athlete,” she said. “I don’t like the way kids specialize these days, because they aren’t as versatile as the athletes back in the day. Now, we’re having to teach a lot of things that kids would have learned through other sports. I don’t think the specialization is good for development.”
Besides sports, Burrell said what helped her development was the South Valley itself. She said the culture and atmosphere helped her thrive.
“I loved my high school experience in the South Valley,” she said, her eyes lighting up. “I loved being in high school. I was one of those kids that I really didn’t want to graduate (laughs). My friends, my teachers at Rio, the community itself — the whole South Valley back when I was in high school — was like family. I loved every bit of it.”
Burrell said, for years, her biggest athletic disappointment was not winning a medal in Athens because of an injury. But the 2005 inductee into the New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame said she got over it, and it’s given her some fabulous tales to tell.
“I talk about it often,” she said of her Olympic days. “It makes for good stories to tell my athletes, especially 2004 in Athens. That experience was the most significant. I finished fourth on a broken foot, and I went into it third in the world.
“It definitely took me a couple of years to get over it — to be OK with getting fourth. But in hindsight, sports defined my life, and track & field has given me so many cool experiences. I’ve traveled all over the world; I’ve met so many great people; I’m making a living doing this; and I get to impact young peoples’ lives. It’s pretty cool. Life is good. It’s really good.”