Grant Fisher's coach talks about the Olympian's historic win at the Paris games

every time I've ever seen him run I've never seen him just get out of a race he stays in it he waits for his opportunity and his determination takes him there and he obviously was in a phenomenal field there that was a Elite field and getting a medal in this race it was just a phenomenal he's really put in a phenomenal amount of work and I don't think people realize what it takes to get to that level I think he mentioned to me in a little comment he goes all the work and effort and that everything has to go into this just to get there Grant blank's Hometown son Grant fiser making history at this year's Paris Olympics fiser winning two bronze medals and becoming the first American man to medal in both a 500 meter and a 5,000 meter that is and 10,000 meter in the Olympic Games Ed Stanberry is Fisher's High School track and field coach and he joins us now here on first at 4 thank you so much for joining us thank you were you surprised at all by Fisher's success at this year's Olympics I personally expected him to do very well getting medals that's another story there's so many variables and factors that can play into that but I'm really not surprised I felt he had that ability for a long time yeah you know and speaking of a long time you were as high school coach um very well decorated uh High School Runner uh Gatorade player of the year for a couple Seasons an 11 time allamerican what's it like coaching someone with that kind of talent it's Unique uh because it doesn't happen all the time we have been blessed with a lot of good Runners and I think that set up a a good pathway and a pattern for him to have goals to shoot for and to go after so it was there for him but when you realize that there's an athlete with that caliber it's there's some managing that has to occur there's a lot of different type of preparation because he would go on and run meets after the season he would um compete in a much longer season and you had to be aware of the fact that he had to do things so we uh we tried to get him in a situation to do those things so he could really excel at the upper level yeah let's talk about excelling um when you talk about excelling at the upper level he's a medaled Olympian now and that last run just describe what you were going through watching uh watching that you were at the watch party and he fell behind he was running up there then he fell behind and then he came back and it was just an amazing feat of determination you know I think a lot of times if you watch the whole Olympics some of the the great athletes that medled at this Olympics you almost saw that with several of them they surged right at the end they find the extra gear there's something in the subconscious where they program themselves to do that and then they find that fifth gear and they get it done and it's a special characteristic of great athletes and I watched it with ly and I watch the finish line and I watched it with the hurdler and we watched it with with Grant yeah and it's kind of personal for you with Grant because you know Grant I've known grant for a long time um you know extremely proud of him I'm I'm happy for the success that he's had um he's worked really hard anybody that puts that type of time into something we know a lot of people that have talent and it doesn't always develop but with with Grant it developed and he made history he did and how's that he's a history maker in the Olympics as well s his dad a text I said he's now an American distance running Legend so that was kind of neat and um so I I think that uh that is unique you know I mean we'll see it in the books you know from down the road and so it's it's pretty remarkable um the wind make it makes the wind even more remarkable knowing that no other American male has meddled in those two uh races before absolutely um you know there had only been four uh previous to that in the last since I what was it almost 14 years something like that mhm and he just did something that nobody else has done to be able to come back and after a 10K get your legs back get rusted up go through a preliminary round and then still have something left to find and that's amazing yeah and my last question for you is how proud right now are you a Fisher in this moment I'm extremely proud just the uniqueness of the situation I think I'm like everybody else in gr blank and Flint they watched it I mean we're all proud of him um we're happy for him it's it's it's great to be part of something uh like that I just uh I wish him the best I don't think we've seen the end of him yet I think he's got I think there's more to come yeah well we're going to be waiting for the big Hometown celebration when and if that happens and uh thank you so much coach for coming in and uh just you know shedding some lights on Grant Fisher for us and thank you we're all cheering him on thank you thank you