University of Georgia Athletics
Quick Chat: Don Babbitt
April 23, 2020 | Track & Field, The Frierson Files
By John Frierson
Staff Writer
You learn something new every time you talk to Georgia track and field associate head coach Don Babbitt, long one of the top throwing coaches in the world. That's because he never stops learning and never stops sharing what he's learned.
Babbitt has served on national teams at international competitions for numerous countries, including Canada, Croatia, the Netherlands and Argentina. He has also been very involved in teaching the sport to other coaches, having written dozens of articles and led clinics and seminars on six of the seven continents. He's also slowly working on a doctorate degree in kinesiology.
Before he was a world-class coach, guiding the likes of Georgia all-time greats Reese Hoffa, Jenny Dahlgren and Denzel Comenentia, and coaching Adam Nelson to the 2004 Olympic shot put gold medal, Babbitt was a javelin thrower at UCLA and an avid beach volleyball player.
As I learned during a recent Quick Chat — a conversation as wide-ranging as Babbitt's experiences and interests — he even played volleyball against Wilt Chamberlain one time. Here's some of what he had to say:
Frierson: You're used to being at the track for hours and hours a day, so how are you filling your time during the coronavirus shutdown?
Babbitt: Actually, I'm pretty busy at home. My wife's still working, she teaches at Athens Academy so she's teaching online, and then my youngest daughter's doing high school online and my oldest daughter and her boyfriend are both down here. They go to school at Princeton but they're obviously doing online classes. They're all pretty busy throughout the day so I'm doing a lot of stuff around the house.
I'm doing the cooking, the shopping, cleaning up around the house — not all of it, of course, but I'm keeping pretty busy doing that stuff to help fill the void from what we can't do training-wise. There's also a little bit of recruiting stuff going on, doing phone calls and online, but we're just very limited in what we can do.
Frierson: Are you enjoying the around-the-house stuff?
Babbitt: It's probably something I've always needed to do more of anyway, so it kind of feels good to be able to do it more. To be honest you, it's kind of fun doing it in some ways. Right now it's a nice change in some ways; my wife and I have been able to keep up a pretty steady regimen of exercise which is nice. With our jobs before, coming and going, we'd leave the house at 7:30 (in the morning) and get home at 7:30 or 8 at night.
It's nice to be able to do that because it's not something we've been able to do together consistently before, but we can do it consistently now. It's nice to be able to reconnect that way.
Frierson: How would you describe yourself as an athlete back in your competitive days?
Babbitt: I would say I was a good college-level athlete. The team that I was on at UCLA was a national championship team, so I was on a very good team. My senior year, I finished sixth at the Pac-10 Championships in the javelin, so anytime you finish in the top eight or top 10, especially at a Power-5 conference like that, I'd call that being a good college-level athlete.
I felt pretty good about my career there and I'd done some other things, like I played a little pro beach volleyball after my college career was done. Just growing up in Santa Monica, and it's true for places like Manhattan Beach, Laguna Beach, beach volleyball was a huge part of the culture.
Frierson: I have to ask, did you ever play with Wilt Chamberlain? I know he was a huge beach volleyball player for a long time.
Babbitt: Yes, one time. There are different scenes — there's the Pacific Palisades scene, there was a Santa Monica Pier scene — and I would say the last two years that Wilt played overlapped with the first two years that I started playing. This would be like 1989 and 1990, so I happened to be down there when he was playing.
There were six courts at the Santa Monica Pier and Wilt always played on the first court. ... We played a 4-on-4 game one time and I wasn't on Wilt's team, I was playing against him. He basically just stood there, he wasn't that mobile at that point, but he stood at the net, and when he put his hands up they probably reached up to about 10 feet. His hands were always flying in the way and he was pretty intimidating even though he was older at the time.
Looking back it's like, wow, that was Wilt Chamberlain.
Frierson: Are you technically Dr. Babbitt now or are you still working on your Ph.D.?
Babbitt: I'm still working on it. I'm kind of going the slow route because I can't do too much at a time. It's probably going to be a couple more years, but it's slowly moving forward.
Frierson: You obviously have a great career and a very full schedule, so what inspired you to pursue the doctorate?
Babbitt: I've always taken a class or two at UGA over the years, starting back to when I first got to UGA in the mid-'90s, through the tuition-assistance program. I remember talking to Coach Dooley at one time and he often audited classes, mainly history and agriculture classes — those were his interests — and that always resonated with me. Here's a guy that's at the top of his field, the A.D. at Georgia, a national-championship football coach, and he's still going back and studying things, always trying to learn new stuff in other areas.
When I've had time, I always try to take a class or two. I was always doing projects and doing studies and getting them published, doing training articles for magazines, so I was doing PhD-type stuff anyway. I said, I'm going to stop doing this and replace any time that I'd spend on this personal development and actually formally work on a Ph.D., where I can really choose a subject and really dig down deep in it.
Frierson: You've coached all over the world and done clinics and things on six of the seven continents, so are you trying to figure out how to do something down on Antarctica?
Babbitt: I will say this, my wife's always talked about going on an Antarctic cruise, and if we ever check that off the bucket list I'm going to have to see, even if it's with some penguins or something. Maybe I can do a short clinic there so that I can say seven out of seven.
Frierson: When you think about when you were finishing school at UCLA and the life you've lived since then, did you have any idea that any of this was coming?
Babbitt: No, no idea at all. I have to say, at that time, some of the things that have gone on in the last 10 or 15 years, they weren't happening at that time either so you couldn't have imagined it. The opportunities have just sort of opened up for me.
Doing the clinics internationally and working with the IAAF (International Amateur Athletic Federation), which is our governing body — they've actually rebranded to World Athletics now — I never thought I'd be in a position to be their lead guy for the throws around the world, in terms of coaching education and helping their curriculum and stuff.
The other thing that's kind of blown my mind a little bit too is, growing up in the '80s, you trained at UCLA, and a lot of the top American athletes were training at UCLA and in Los Angeles. The Cold War and the Berlin Wall were still around then and now so much has changed — those are the people I'm actually collaborating with and in touch with, the Far Eastern coaches and the Russian coaches. I've done clinics with them, written articles together and done some studies with them, too.
Growing up with the Wall being in place, there was never a thought that you'd meet these people. And then everything changed and that was kind of mind-blowing. A lot of the stuff that's happened to me, you just couldn't conceive it happening, but the world has changed so much.
(This Q&A was lightly edited for length and clarity.)
Staff Writer
You learn something new every time you talk to Georgia track and field associate head coach Don Babbitt, long one of the top throwing coaches in the world. That's because he never stops learning and never stops sharing what he's learned.
Babbitt has served on national teams at international competitions for numerous countries, including Canada, Croatia, the Netherlands and Argentina. He has also been very involved in teaching the sport to other coaches, having written dozens of articles and led clinics and seminars on six of the seven continents. He's also slowly working on a doctorate degree in kinesiology.
Before he was a world-class coach, guiding the likes of Georgia all-time greats Reese Hoffa, Jenny Dahlgren and Denzel Comenentia, and coaching Adam Nelson to the 2004 Olympic shot put gold medal, Babbitt was a javelin thrower at UCLA and an avid beach volleyball player.
As I learned during a recent Quick Chat — a conversation as wide-ranging as Babbitt's experiences and interests — he even played volleyball against Wilt Chamberlain one time. Here's some of what he had to say:
Frierson: You're used to being at the track for hours and hours a day, so how are you filling your time during the coronavirus shutdown?
Babbitt: Actually, I'm pretty busy at home. My wife's still working, she teaches at Athens Academy so she's teaching online, and then my youngest daughter's doing high school online and my oldest daughter and her boyfriend are both down here. They go to school at Princeton but they're obviously doing online classes. They're all pretty busy throughout the day so I'm doing a lot of stuff around the house.
I'm doing the cooking, the shopping, cleaning up around the house — not all of it, of course, but I'm keeping pretty busy doing that stuff to help fill the void from what we can't do training-wise. There's also a little bit of recruiting stuff going on, doing phone calls and online, but we're just very limited in what we can do.
Frierson: Are you enjoying the around-the-house stuff?
Babbitt: It's probably something I've always needed to do more of anyway, so it kind of feels good to be able to do it more. To be honest you, it's kind of fun doing it in some ways. Right now it's a nice change in some ways; my wife and I have been able to keep up a pretty steady regimen of exercise which is nice. With our jobs before, coming and going, we'd leave the house at 7:30 (in the morning) and get home at 7:30 or 8 at night.
It's nice to be able to do that because it's not something we've been able to do together consistently before, but we can do it consistently now. It's nice to be able to reconnect that way.
Frierson: How would you describe yourself as an athlete back in your competitive days?
Babbitt: I would say I was a good college-level athlete. The team that I was on at UCLA was a national championship team, so I was on a very good team. My senior year, I finished sixth at the Pac-10 Championships in the javelin, so anytime you finish in the top eight or top 10, especially at a Power-5 conference like that, I'd call that being a good college-level athlete.
I felt pretty good about my career there and I'd done some other things, like I played a little pro beach volleyball after my college career was done. Just growing up in Santa Monica, and it's true for places like Manhattan Beach, Laguna Beach, beach volleyball was a huge part of the culture.
Frierson: I have to ask, did you ever play with Wilt Chamberlain? I know he was a huge beach volleyball player for a long time.
Babbitt: Yes, one time. There are different scenes — there's the Pacific Palisades scene, there was a Santa Monica Pier scene — and I would say the last two years that Wilt played overlapped with the first two years that I started playing. This would be like 1989 and 1990, so I happened to be down there when he was playing.
There were six courts at the Santa Monica Pier and Wilt always played on the first court. ... We played a 4-on-4 game one time and I wasn't on Wilt's team, I was playing against him. He basically just stood there, he wasn't that mobile at that point, but he stood at the net, and when he put his hands up they probably reached up to about 10 feet. His hands were always flying in the way and he was pretty intimidating even though he was older at the time.
Looking back it's like, wow, that was Wilt Chamberlain.
Frierson: Are you technically Dr. Babbitt now or are you still working on your Ph.D.?
Babbitt: I'm still working on it. I'm kind of going the slow route because I can't do too much at a time. It's probably going to be a couple more years, but it's slowly moving forward.
Frierson: You obviously have a great career and a very full schedule, so what inspired you to pursue the doctorate?
Babbitt: I've always taken a class or two at UGA over the years, starting back to when I first got to UGA in the mid-'90s, through the tuition-assistance program. I remember talking to Coach Dooley at one time and he often audited classes, mainly history and agriculture classes — those were his interests — and that always resonated with me. Here's a guy that's at the top of his field, the A.D. at Georgia, a national-championship football coach, and he's still going back and studying things, always trying to learn new stuff in other areas.
When I've had time, I always try to take a class or two. I was always doing projects and doing studies and getting them published, doing training articles for magazines, so I was doing PhD-type stuff anyway. I said, I'm going to stop doing this and replace any time that I'd spend on this personal development and actually formally work on a Ph.D., where I can really choose a subject and really dig down deep in it.
Frierson: You've coached all over the world and done clinics and things on six of the seven continents, so are you trying to figure out how to do something down on Antarctica?
Babbitt: I will say this, my wife's always talked about going on an Antarctic cruise, and if we ever check that off the bucket list I'm going to have to see, even if it's with some penguins or something. Maybe I can do a short clinic there so that I can say seven out of seven.
Frierson: When you think about when you were finishing school at UCLA and the life you've lived since then, did you have any idea that any of this was coming?
Babbitt: No, no idea at all. I have to say, at that time, some of the things that have gone on in the last 10 or 15 years, they weren't happening at that time either so you couldn't have imagined it. The opportunities have just sort of opened up for me.
Doing the clinics internationally and working with the IAAF (International Amateur Athletic Federation), which is our governing body — they've actually rebranded to World Athletics now — I never thought I'd be in a position to be their lead guy for the throws around the world, in terms of coaching education and helping their curriculum and stuff.
The other thing that's kind of blown my mind a little bit too is, growing up in the '80s, you trained at UCLA, and a lot of the top American athletes were training at UCLA and in Los Angeles. The Cold War and the Berlin Wall were still around then and now so much has changed — those are the people I'm actually collaborating with and in touch with, the Far Eastern coaches and the Russian coaches. I've done clinics with them, written articles together and done some studies with them, too.
Growing up with the Wall being in place, there was never a thought that you'd meet these people. And then everything changed and that was kind of mind-blowing. A lot of the stuff that's happened to me, you just couldn't conceive it happening, but the world has changed so much.
(This Q&A was lightly edited for length and clarity.)
John Frierson is the staff writer for the UGA Athletic Association and curator of the ITA Men's Tennis Hall of Fame. You can find his work at: Frierson Files. He's also on Twitter: @FriersonFiles and @ITAHallofFame.
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