DyeStatCal - internet home of California track

October 28th, 2005

Photo by Don Gosney - 1980

One of the legendary weight athletes that came out of Newport Harbor HS over the decades, Terry Albritton thre the Shot Put 67-09 for the #2 prep mark in the nation in 1972. That was a pretty special year in the event in the Golden State, with Randy Cross (Crespi later of 49er football fame) 67-06.5, Dave Gerasimchuk (Narbonne) 65-07.5, Brett Mannon (Los Gatos) 63-11.5, Mike Metoyer (Gardena) 63-01.75, Warren Shank (Rio Americano) 62-10, and Mike Budincich (South Gate) 62-09.75. Cross won the State meet at 66-07.5, with Albritton 63-02 that year in Oroville. Interestingly, the previous year, 1971, at UCLA Mark Stevens had won for Newport at 67-02.5, with Albritton 65-05 that junior year--as we said Newport has always had some throwers (check State all-time list for the event which does not include Stevens--maybe the State's best "one-school" event list)!!!!!

State All-Time List - Shot Put - by Bob Womack and Rich Gonzalez
76-02.00 -Brent Noon (Fallbrook) 1990
71-10.00 *Van Mounts (Bakersfield) 1997
69-06.50 Brian Blutreich (Capistrano Valley) 1985
69-03-75 Jim Neidhart (Newport Harbor, Newport Beach) 1973
68-05.50 Steve Montgomery (Lassen, Susanville) 1976
68-05.00 Dave Kurrasch (Newport Harbor, Newport Beach) 1975
67-09.75 John Hubbell (Poly, Long Beach) 1966
67-09.00 Terry Albritton (Newport Harbor, Newport Beach) 1972
67-09.00 John McKenzie (Hart, Newhall) 1976
67-08.25 Dave Doupe (Inglewood) 1973

Tony Ciarelli below traces Terry's career, with some sad ups and downs with injury and things like Olympic boycotts along the way (1980). With a break or two he would really have held a high placing among a history of Golden State All-Time track and field athletes.

He did hold the world record in the event at the senior level for a time, with a 71-08.25 (21.85 metric) toss in 1976 while at the University of Hawaii. He broke the record of Al Fuerbach (another legend who is still in the greater Santa Cruz area and was a help to Julie Dufresne (Harbor, Santa Cruz) this past spring), who had held it for three years at 71-07.25 (21.82m).

Tony does a good job of setting the tone for the spirit with which Terry lived his life - kind of a giant among men (check the picture above) who was the best in the world at what he did at one time!! In Track and Field News his death was listed as a heart attack.

Tony Ciarelli's summary:

"Terry was an amazing guy, in high school he was California Player of the year in football, 67' shot putter and if he wasn't a 4.0 student he was very close to it. I think he would have been a better discus thrower but as you might remember for some reason we did not have the discus in the Sunset league back then. Terry went to Stanford out of high school but had some problems adjusting with the football coaches so he left there after a year and a half. We both ended up at the University of Hawaii back in 1974, I had been competing against Terry since 6th grade, so we knew each other pretty good and became room mates. Terry had already broken the World Junior Record 66' 6" and became the World Record holder while at Hawaii 71'10". The thing is when Terry broke the Junior record he could have still been in high school he turned 17 about half way through his senior year, these days his parents would have held him back 2 years, that would have been scary for everyone football and track. He had the misfortune of rupturing a pectoral muscle just the 76 Olympics and was unable to go, at the time he was the number 1 shot putter in the World. In 1980 he was once again on top but the boycott kept everyone from going. After that he became the strength coach at UH for a couple of years then he moved to Maui and became a teacher and coach. Then two years ago he decided he wanted to move to southeast Asia and travel, he was doing just that when he died.
Terry was a great friend a great athlete and could be considered the definition of a FREE SPIRIT."
Tony Ciarelli