RANDY HISNER
WZBD.com
“He’s not that big.” That was my first thought when I interviewed Adams Central senior discus thrower Trenton Hoffman after he had won his event at the New Haven Sectional with a personal best throw of 158-6. He could pass for a 400-meter runner, I thought, or maybe a long jumper.
But he’s neither of those things; he’s a discus thrower, and an excellent one. He’s not only the sectional champ, but also the ACAC champ and the Carroll Regional runner up, a placing that qualified him for the state meet this Friday at I.U.-Bloomington.
At 6-2 and 170 pounds, he’s not small, but in the world of high school throwers, he’s definitely on the slender side, most of his competitors outweighing him by at least 30 pounds.
“I’m definitely not the big guy,” Hoffman said. “I’m always the smallest guy at the competition, so I’ve really had to work on form, the footwork, and the drive to throw farther.”
Form and footwork—the biomechanics of throwing. To be an elite discus thrower is, almost by definition, to be obsessed with biomechanics. The angle of release. The lengths of limbs as levers. The maximization of rotational forces. And always, the footwork, the footwork.
The heart of the discus thrower’s spin is the elegant dance step that propels him across the circle like a dervish and produces the prodigious forces that enable him to launch the discus high and far.
Hoffman knows the ways the footwork can go wrong. “There’s always the constant thing of coming out of the back of the circle and getting the right foot in the middle. Sometimes it lands too far to the left or right, and that will throw your whole body off,” he said. “Another part is where your left foot lands at the front of the ring. Again, if it lands too far left or right, it will influence how strong you can throw.”
Hoffman excels at the spin and the other technical aspects of his event. He has to. “Yes, 100%,” he said. “All the way back to when I was at middle school state, people commented on what my form was compared to the other guys’. It just kind of stuck out to everyone, and it’s been a driving force. I’ve continued to work on it in high school.”
Elite throwers have perfected the timing of the successive body parts that must rotate in the right sequence and at the right moment.
First the feet turn forward, next the lower legs and knees, then thighs and hips, followed by the torso, the shoulders, and finally the arm—each part rotating forward while the next lags behind, accumulating tension as the muscles and connective tissue stretch like rubber bands before releasing that tension in a rapid forward rotation. This is called the stretch reflex.
“It’s all a kind of chain reaction,” Hoffman said. “It’s an athletic sequence. That’s how to get the most power in any sport.”
Hoffman counters his overall size handicap with his own advantages. One is his wingspan. His long arms help generate speed in the discus as it travels a big arc. His lineage helps too: His dad once held the Adams Central shot put record. “He definitely was a help, especially early on,” Hoffman says. “Since he was a shot put guy more than a discus guy, he was able to help me with the basic fundamentals, but I quickly kind of surpassed his knowledge, and it was at that point that I looked to YouTube videos. I watch a lot of videos of elite discus throwers. I can just drill it over and over in my head and imagine how it feels. I think that helps a lot.”
And then there’s the Adams Central throws coach, Neil Henning, a former standout thrower at Cedarville University in Ohio. Henning grew to love the sport in college (2004-2008) and stayed on at Cedarville to coach there from 2008 to 2014. Since 2016, he has coached clients privately, and then this year he moved to Indiana and started coaching the Jets’ throwers.
Hoffman appreciates Henning’s competitive background. “He has thrown against Olympians,” he said. “He’s got some really cool stories.” But more important than his stories is his technical expertise. His extensive knowledge and coaching experience enable him to identify the tiniest flaws in Hoffman’s mechanics. “He’ll watch me throw and give me one or two things to focus on,” Hoffman said. The constant feedback helps Hoffman refine his technique.
Henning loves Hoffman’s drive. “He’s one of the hardest workers on the team,” he said. “He’s out there whenever he can be.” About Hoffman’s chances at state, he says, “Anything can happen.” Hoffman is seeded 24th, but if he puts everything together, if he performs everything flawlessly—the footwork is right, his hips drive optimally, the angle of release is perfect—he could add 5-10 feet to his PR, and that would put him in the mid-160s, good enough to compete for a top-eight medal.
No matter how the state meet goes for Hoffman, it won’t be the end of his throwing career. The 2023 Adams Central salutatorian has earned a combination academic/athletic scholarship to NAIA national track and field power Indiana Tech, where he will study business and sports management.
The discus will be the first event Friday, starting at 3:00 P.M.