From Fox to Febles: Over a Century of FP Track & Field Success

By Charles Gstalder
 
Since its founding in the mid-19th century, Fordham Preparatory School in the Bronx has established itself as one of the nation's preeminent high school track and field programs.

In FP Track and Field Head Coach George Febles’ telling, it all starts with Joe Fox. Following World War II, Joe Fox ‘29 reenergized the Catholic High School Athletic Association and the sport of high school track and field. In the following decades, while Fox and his assistant coaches, Jim Scott and George Febles Sr. were coaching across the CHASAA at Fordham Prep, Xavier High School and Regis High school, a young George Febles was watching and learning, absorbing the skills he’d use upon taking over as head coach at Fordham Prep in the late 80s, a job that he says Fox helped him secure.

“My first year we had a bigger team than we’d been used to - 40 kids, and so we started having success and doing well. I was using the lessons taught by my dad and Joe Fox and Jim Scott and also learning a lot and trying new stuff that I thought might be better than the old days” recalled Febles.

According to Coach Febles, FP’s track program underwent a significant transformation in the early 90s with the addition of two assistant coaches. The first was the inclusion of Febles' father, George Febles Senior.

Febles Sr. explained that after nearly three decades as a coach at Xavier High School and Regis High School, he wanted to focus solely on hurdles, an opportunity his son offered him. Once at the prep, he embarked on an unorthodox strategy that led to monumental success.

“I had a theory at that time that coaching hurdlers is best done two days a week because it's therapeutic for them to run straight the days before they're bending all their ligaments… It's a crazy theory, but it paid off because in 2009, we won the national championship and broke the national record.” said Febles Sr. “And since that time, we have won the national championships in shuttle Hurdle Relays three more times” he added.

While Febles Sr. contributions to the hurdle program are legendary, Coach Febles explained that the 1993 inclusion of Brian Carney, FP’s current Vice President for Mission and Identity and Chief Strategic Officer, allowed the program to truly expand into the field side of the sport, notably by bringing the Pole Vault to Fordham Prep.

“Mr. Caney was really big. He ran for Molloy and brought a lot of the way Molloy was coached — big team, lots of coaches, field events. He invented the Pole vault for us. So he took us from just a track team, which was where we were, to now where we’re covering every single event” said Febles.

In Carney’s eyes, the expansion into field events reveals the universal appeal of the sport.

“In 1993 is when we started billing it as ‘there's something for everyone’  because some people really like running, but other people like a combination of skills type events. Just expanding that with the Pole vault and the field events gave the opportunity for more kids to be involved and to find something that they were passionate about and really loved.”

Across all of the coaching staff, development regardless of experience or talent level is emphasized.

“We can point to dozens of kids that came in and as freshmen on the surface didn't seem to be super athletes or super talented, but they developed and they turned into many of them division one athletes that went on to have great college careers because of the program's philosophy of just working with kids at any level and developing them into super athletes.” said Brian Carney.

Perhaps nowhere is that more true than in the recent performances of senior John Canale in the Indoor 800 meter run and junior Julian Lynch in the Long Jump and Pole Vault.

Canale, who in his telling had never run track prior to attending Fordham Prep, recently broke a 68 year old record set by the legendary Tom Carrol ‘57. Carrol’s record had been the national record at the time it was set. Even Canale himself was shocked by his performance.

“I didn't think anything about the 800 record when I was going into this race. I was doing a new warmup routine so I didn't even have any expectations for myself. It was actually a big surprise” said Canale, who will be running for the University of Connecticut after graduating from Fordham Prep.

Lynch is coming off a historic indoor season in his own right, recently shattering the Prep’s pole vault and long jump records.

In the long jump, Lynch cites a modification in his approach as the reason for his record.

“Coach Attalah asked me if I wanted to go to an eighth step — in the jumping events, you can start from however far back on the runway you want” explained Lynch. The shift to a longer approach run worked- with Lynch setting the record on his second of three possible attempts, then breaking it by an even greater margin on his third. Adriano Atallah, a member of the prep’s science faculty who Coaches Varsity Sprints and Jumps, anticipates Lynch continuing to expand his record setting margins. “To have an athlete surpass 23 feet at all is remarkable. But as a junior, nonetheless, is pretty spectacular. I'm excited to work with him this outdoor season and going on to next year, too, as a senior. We have to start thinking about some really scary big numbers, which you don't get to think about every day” reflected Atallah.

Lynch similarly cites his Pole Vault coaches as the reason for his ability to fly so high. “Pole vaulting is just so technical and you need an expert set of eyes on you for you to be able to really make any progress.”

For Lynch, those expert eyes belong to pole vault coach Jerry Cahil, and Coach Cahill loves what he sees.

“Julian's the real deal. He's an elite vaulter. I video Julian’s jumps and we talk and chat about it because there’s always that kid that does that extra bit of work, so you give them that extra coaching, and Julian is that kid” Cahill said proudly.

Summarizing the secrets of such a storied program's success would seemingly require spending one’s whole life around FP Track and Field. But Mattie Febles ‘22, the son and grandson of Coaches Febles and Febles Sr. literally has.

Febles ‘22, who recalls a childhood spent running around the prep’s Joe Fox Memorial track while his dad and grandpa coached and now assists with coaching while running for Fordham University, believes the program’s success stems from the approach the coaches take with their athletes.

“I think other programs could be successful as well with how they're intense, disciplined, and pushing kids to their limits. But I feel like with Fordham Prep, if you show up and try every day, you'll definitely get better" said Febles ‘22.  “The coaches are a support system, they're here to encourage you and I feel like that's what makes kids fall in love with the sport.”