Healthy Elliott is aiming for gold

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Isaac Elliott could not have cared less about his times. He just wanted to win.

Last Thursday marked the first time the Ambridge senior competed healthy at a WPIAL track and field championship — coincidentally, he brought home two WPIAL gold medals that night.

“It feels like I can put the past behind me and move on,” Elliott said.

After struggling with hamstring and hip flexor injuries for the first three years of his high school career, Elliott won the 100-meter dash with a time of 10.74 and the 400-meter dash with a time of 48.99. He’ll have his first opportunity for a healthy showing at the PIAA track and field championships beginning today at Shippensburg University.

At WPIALs, Elliott placed seventh in the 100 his freshman year and third in the 200 his junior year. He tried competing at states last year but couldn’t post competitive times with his nagging lower-body injury. This year, the Duquesne commit gets to run at maximum horsepower, and will compete in the 100 and 400 again.

“I’m just happy I finally get to go and be healthy there, and just go all out,” Elliott said.

With Elliott facing yet another hip flexor injury last spring, his dad, Phill, reached out to Roger and Jonathan Kowal for help. The father and son duo both ran track at Ambridge, with Jonathan going on to run at Penn State and Roger running at The University of Texas at El Paso.

The Kowals helped Elliott rehab and began to transform his training regime. Jonathan was eventually named Ambridge’s track coach and continued working with Elliott to rebound from his injuries, introducing longer warm-ups to his routine.

From distance work in the fall transitioning to plyometrics and stamina work to getting Elliott ready to compete in January, the goal is to train him like a college athlete so he can run at the highest level.

While injuries made Isaac’s career at Ambridge more challenging, Phill watched him fight back to where he is now.

“From my perspective, a lot of kids, and even myself probably would have given up, in a way,” Phill said. “But he just kept fighting through it. His goal and his dream was to win WPIALs, and now states, and he wants to go to college and do his very best.”

If anyone mentions Elliott’s injuries or his thoughts linger in past seasons, Jonathan snaps him back to the present.

“I say ‘That’s in the past. We don’t worry about that,’” Jonathan said. “‘We worry about the future. We’re strong enough and we’re ready to go.’”

It made it easy for Elliott to adjust to a new training schedule late in his high school career since it led to positive results when rehabbing, Jonathan said. Two WPIAL golds later and with PIAAs coming up, those results are still coming in.

“All the confidence just keeps building,” Jonathan said. “You always want to have a positive atmosphere around, that’s something we try to instill. But positivity, then results, he’s trusting in the training, and it’s all paying off. He doesn’t give you any pushback.”

Elliott’s goal at the PIAA championship is the same as at WPIALs. Just win, regardless of time. He has had to wait long enough already.