Near Olympian

Forgotten in the annals of time is the story about a farm kid from Ritzville that nearly made the Olympic track team. Walter “Spike” Arlt was an outstanding athlete at Ritzville High School and as a track hurdler he set a state record for the 120 yard high hurdles in 1956 his senior year. That mark still stands as an all-time Bronco track record since the 120 yard high hurdles is now the 110 Meter hurdles.

Spike would go onto run track at WSU and in 1960 was selected as the WSU athlete of the year. After the season ended he was invited to try out for the USA Olympic team. The tryouts were held at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California on July 1st and 2nd, 1960.

Spike would need to place high in the preliminary heats in order to make the finals. Spike did very well finishing in the top two of each heat, which meant that he would be in the finals where the top three finishers would go to Rome. Spike ran a 14.2 in the race and would finish in 5th place. The 4th place finisher also was clocked at 14.2. Unfortunately the top three were first place 13.4 and 2nd and 3rd at 13.5 seconds. So the dream of going to the Olympics wasn’t meant to be but a great showing for an exceptional small town athlete.

So how did the three hurdlers fare at the Rome Olympics? Lee Calhoun won gold, Willie Lee May took the silver and Hayes Jones brought home the bronze. Even though they finished closely at the trials there were no upsets in Rome as they finished in the same order as they did at Stanford.

Spike gave it his all that’s for sure. He would put his education to use and would teach and coach at Harrington High School. His 1964 basketball team would end up taking 2nd at state losing to Cathlamet by one at the Spokane Coliseum. The Panthers were returning a loaded lineup for 1965 and would be odds on favorites to win it all. But Spike had the opportunity to try his hand at coaching college track at Central Washington State College, now Central Washington University. He had a highly successful career for the Wildcats as a Cross Country and head Track and Field coach.

Spike was very instrumental along with many members of his RHS class of 1956 to raise money to install an all-weather track at the high school facility. Money raised also helped to resurface the tennis courts. Although there wasn’t quite enough money raised to install a new track at a metric dimension there was a vote to the people for a facilities upgrade and it passed. Because someone with a bunch of knowledge about track and field and running, we as a community have a facility to walk or run on and host track meets. The remaining funds that were left went to the school to help with the project.

We’ve had some very good athletes that came out of our communities and sports programs. There have been track, baseball, basketball, football, wrestling, softball, golf and volleyball athletes that went on to have successful college careers. For a few more they can also say they played professionally. But so far we’ve only had one near Olympian and that is Spike Arlt and that’s not too bad.

So as you watch the Paris Summer Olympics starting later this week that a lot of time and effort goes into becoming an above average athlete. There are a wide variety of competitions that will captivate audiences and I know we all have that favorite sporting event to watch. But try to get a chance to see the hurdle races one of my favorites as well as Spike Arlt’s.

— Dale Anderson is a sports columnist from Ritzville. To contact him, email [email protected].