Pete Rittenburg: Jack of All Trades

Call him the "Renaissance Athlete."

While most athletes specialize in one or two events, Harvard's Pete Rittenburg has chosen a different approach. The successful senior spreads his talents over several events.

Rittenburg won his third straight Track and Field Association-USA National Indoor Pentathlon Championship on January 23. The pentathlon is the indoor counterpart of the decathlon. The indoor version consists of five events, the 55 meter high hurdles, the long jump, the shot put and the grueling 1000 meter race.

Rittenburg captured the title with his best performance ever, as a fourth place finish in the hurdles, a second place in the long jump, a first place finish in the high jump and a second in the 1000 gave Rittenburg a total of 3638, over 200 points better than his nearest competition.

But nagging injuries to his knee and back have blocked Rittenburg's path to success, and his future is still uncertain.

When he arrived here four years ago fresh out of Reading Memorial High School, the Mather House resident had no idea what a pentathlon was. He played freshman football in the fall. But the track squad of 1979 was laden with talented half milers--that was the year the two-mile relay team won the Millrose Games in New York--and Rittenburg was moved to the 400 meter hardles during the spring season.

It was not until his sophomore year, however, that he began contemplating multi-event competition. A sign advertising the TFA-USA Pentathlon Championship in Storrs, Conn. caught his eye and started him thinking.

He had fooled around with the shot put and the javelin in high school, so the only event he needed to master was the high hurdles, still his weakest event.

"I had my eyes on the IC4As, but in each of my individual events I was just below the qualifying times. Since there was no one event at which I excelled, I thought maybe I could qualify in the Pentathlon," Rittenburg explains.

So, without ever having competed in a pentathlon, Rittenburg headed to UConn to vie for the national title.

"I went down a little naive sophomore," he reminisces, "and ended up winning the thing. I didn't know what I was getting myself into."

What he was getting himself into was multi-event competition. His next move was to prep for the decathlon, the 10-event contest that consists of the 100-meter sprint, the long jump, the high jump, the 400 meter race, the 100-meter high hurdles, the discus, the pole vault, the javelin and the 1500-meter run.

Rittenburg's major obstacle was the pole vault, so the summer between his sophomore and junior years, he went about remedying that situation. He headed to Edmonton, Alberta to live with his Harvard roommate Dave Grace and join the Edmonton Olympic Track and Field club. There he competed all through the summer and worked on his pole vaulting.

With his newfound skill, Rittenburg returned to Cambridge determined to devote II his time to training for the pentathlon and decathlon. Unfortunately, on the second day of practice he injured his knee, and before he had fully recovered from that mishap, he developed a disc problem in his back. Despite these setbacks, he continued to work out when he could.

Come January, he was back in Storrs and once again came away with the title. However, that was the highlight of what turned out to be a very frustrating year.

"Because I was injured I never really got myself into top shape, and because I wasn't in great shape I kept getting injured," he says. "It was a vicious circle."

This past summer, Rittenburg returned to the Great White North, planning to train, but his back acted up in a meet and he took off the next three months. This fall, he began training slowly and carefully with emphasis on getting himself into running shape rather than working on the throwing and jumping events that aggravate his back.

Being in good running shape is one of the keys to Rittenburg's success. His half-mile background and gritty determination and endurance make the final running event one of his best.

"It's a real psychological advantage to know that I can make up ground in the final event. It keeps me from getting discourage if I fall behind early."

Versatility seems to run in the Rittenburg family. Pete's father Bob Rittenburg ran for the Harvard track team from 1951-1955, and in the Yale meet of his senior year, the elder Rittenburg scored 26 points by nabbing four first places and two seconds. He also won the Bingham award for the class of '55 and gained election to the Harvard Varsity Hall of Fame two years ago.

The younger Rittenburg does not mind the fact that there is no one event in which he truly excels. "The variety keeps me motivated," he explains. "Inevitably you will have peaks and valleys. If you get discouraged in one event, you always have another one where things are going well."

Rittenburg's biggest obstacles are time and injuries. There never seems to be enough time to train for all 10 events, and because of his back injury, he must be wary every time he competes.

If he can stay injury-free, Rittenburg does not rule out the 1988 Olympics. "If I make it through spring decathlon schedule without injury and it seems like I have a shot, then I would consider them [the Olympics]. After graduating, I would like to go out West or South where I could train all year."

If after this spring things don't look that optimistic, Rittenburg would characteristically take it in stride. "If things don't work out, I'll just hang it up, and say I had fun."