Fifth-year sociology student Jason Kerr tore up the track at the Canadian Interuniversity Sport championships in Windsor last weekend, bringing home four medals. Kerr has been awarded this week’s Purple Pipe due to his outstanding performance and he took some time out of his day to sit down with the Gazette to talk about the 4x400m relay, nerves and visiting the ATM in his underwear.

Why/how did you get started in track and field?
I remember wanting to be on the high jump mat as a kid. I was good at the jumps when I was really young – we’re talking Grade 4, 5, 6. And then I stopped and I actually gave up sports entirely. I was born an athlete. I knew that, but for whatever reason I went away from it. In Grade 12 I played basketball and our team actually went to OFSAA, and we did really well. My basketball coach was always telling me “you’re the fastest one on the court at all times,” so he put me into track. I did two months of high school track in my final year, and I actually did totally different events than what I’m doing now. I did long jump and I ran the 400. I was very skinny; we’re talking like 6 foot and 130 pounds. I started off in long distance, and found out pretty quickly that it wasn’t my game, so I switched over after that, and it just kept getting better since then.

What’s your favourite spot to be in for the relay?
I like everything. If I’m in great shape, especially in the 4×400, you can run me anywhere. I really enjoy running the final leg ‘cause the pressure’s on. This year we kind of loaded the relay in the middle and towards the end, so we had all our strong legs that we ran all year go back to back-to-back. The guy we ran first, Brandon, at nationals had a great first leg. He didn’t even run on our team all year. In the shorter relays though I like to come out of the blocks, because we like to get the lead and maintain the lead.

What goes through your head as you’re waiting for the pistol?
You want nothing to be going through your head. It’s kind of one of those things when the gun goes you want your mind to be so clear that you don’t hear the gun, you’ve already reacted to the gun before you can even feel like you’ve processed that information. I remember when I was kid I got that nervous feeling [thinking] “am I going to do this? Am I going to screw this up?” As I’ve gotten older though I’m way more relaxed and if I’m prepared I’m excited to do it and there’s no real worry in it. But I look back and I almost wish that I could get that feeling that I had when I was kid. You think you hate it at the time, but the days that I get that now, I know it’s going to be a good day.

What are the perks of being a track and field athlete?
Where to start. The first thing every guy is thinking is the girls. You’re around great people. Another good thing is you get general fitness. Track and field athletes are generally the most fit athletes that you’re going to find. You can’t really compete unless you’re at the utmost, physical competitiveness. Track isn’t a team sport like ball games – which I love just the same – but it’s different in the sense that it’s just you and the facility you run in, or on the track it’s you versus yourself. They line up eight people in a race, but no one can cross into my lane and change what I do. That’s one of the big things that I like about track is that when I finish, positive or negative, the only person I can turn to say “what happened” or “congratulations” is myself and my coaches – there’s nobody else at fault really.

What was it like being on the same team as [former Mustang track and football athlete] Randy McAuley?
Randy McAuley is actually one of my best friends. We’re actually going out for a St. Patty’s day drink right after this. Randy started as a bit of a mentor to me — I was a bit of a wild goose in first-year. No one really knew how to handle me, and me and Randy just clicked right away – same personality, same interests, pretty much the same dude except one is a skinny white guy and one is a big muscular black dude. It was great. Randy can get around the track, get around the football field and get around downtown London better than anybody, so it was definitely a great few years with him.

Any crazy travelling stories?
I remember in my first year when we stayed over in Saskatchewan, at four in the morning me and another guy got hungry so we went down to the ATM, but for whatever reason we were just in our underwear. One of the other teams was actually waiting for a flight out in the lobby, and they ended up seeing us and taking pictures of these two dudes at the ATM at four in the morning, getting money out and it kind of created a scandal. Things went up on Facebook, and it was like “what were these guys doing, naked getting $100 out of the ATM at four in the morning?” There are endless stories and I can’t even say most of them. I’ve grown up a lot and kind of gotten away from that; I don’t party as hard anymore.

If you could be the best at any event, what would it be?
When I first started I could’ve done anything – well, I don’t think I’d be a great shot-putter – and I chose to do what I did ‘cause I wanted to be where everyone was watching, so I ran the 100m. And looking at me you’d probably say, “well I don’t think you made the right choice” and I’ve gotten that my entire career, but I’ve always just kind of striven to prove everybody wrong.

How do you stay in shape during the off-season?
I had major injury problems so I actually missed seasons at a time, so I did have a long off-season for a while. Ideally I would transition about a week after CIS championships and I would already be doing prep for outdoors, hoping to run again in May. This past summer I made the Canadian team and we were supposed to run into September, and I ended up getting hurt, so I missed that but I was training through September and then come October you’re already back in the university season. The off-season at most is probably going to be September for me, maybe a bit of August. I normally relax a lot actually – try to hit up the beach, just normal people stuff.

Has your sprinting ever come in handy in real life?
I haven’t committed any crimes recently that would need me to be running from the police. If you commit a crime as a sprinter you’re going to be pretty hard to catch, but I haven’t been doing that lately. I actually raced a guy in downtown London for 10 bucks, but that was years ago. It was just a random occurrence on the street.

What’s your favourite bar in London?
I don’t want to say anything run of the mill here … put in the Richmond Tavern.