Passion for Performance: Fantroy Keeps Saints on Track

In all, Fantroy, 67, has coached track athletes for almost four decades. He has mentored many of them at private academies or clubs he founded, as well.

Only late last year did he retire from the City of Portland’s Parks and Recreation Department, his primary income source for 17 years. He continues coaching this spring at Mt. Hood, something he has great passion for, even if there’s modest compensation for his efforts.

“I like to take the average athlete and make them better than what they were in high school and that’s where I really get the sense of pride,” he said. In fact, he calls their personal development his “main philosophy” and a very important part of his life.

It shows in the accomplishments of men and women he has coached. At least two Mt. Hood competitors have set conference records on his watch, one of the records breaking a mark that stood 135 years, he told The Advocate. Dozens of his private students have earned state or national championships and records, as well.

Fantroy said he takes pride in helping students at Mt. Hood develop, both competitively and academically.

“I like to get the block of clay and develop it and sculpt it out, until – you know – they move onto the next level, if they desire,” he said. He is committed to the classroom success of his student athletes, too, and said that through the grade-check mechanism he helps his athletes succeed academically.

“Oh, I keep ’em on point,” said Fantroy. He explains that when his team members come up short of academic benchmarks they need to compete on the team, he reframes that experience for them, which he calls “academic recovery.” While those students can’t wear the college’s banner in competitions (until again meeting academic standards), they can still train with their team, still work on improving.

“I don’t throw nobody away. They got to say, ‘Coach, I quit, I’m quitting school’ and all that” before he will let a lagging student leave for good. “I try to give them a way out without destroying them.”

As a Mt. Hood coach, Fantroy has had to persevere, himself. Part of his experience as a coach has been submitting his part of the Athletics budget requests that are vetted and approved by MHCC’s student government (ASMHCC) each year.

There have been frequent budget reductions during his time here. “I’ve been cutting and cutting and cutting and cutting,” Fantroy said. “It’s to the point I can’t cut no more.”

One of the ways he’s coped with managing his team budgets is by repeating what he said is an old Danish expression: “I will work with the flower I have.” He added that “over the years I’ve learned how to work with what I have, and that’s throughout life.”

The same might apply to his student athletes at Mt. Hood, which offers an important path for many. “Community colleges are a development place for athletes and for people who don’t want to go to a four-year (university) right away, plus – economically – it saves them a lot of money,” he said.

While he has some suggestions about how coaches at Mt. Hood should be paid, he said, “The budget is not the issue with me.” He remains committed to the college, currently in his ninth year on campus, and may continue coaching for some years to come.

As a self-described “Black man in America,” Fantroy told The Advocate his experiences growing up in the South have shaped his perception of Athletics budget process.

“I grew up in Mississippi, segregated South, Jim Crow, and we didn’t have indoor plumbing… but I worked with what I had,” he said. “Indoor plumbing was at the school.”

Eventually, his father chose to move the family to Los Angeles – a huge change in some ways, not nearly enough in others.

“He got us out of the fire, but we went into the skillet. The fire was Jim Crow, the skillet was South Central LA,” Fantroy explained.

He would move to Portland himself in 1988 because he didn’t want his kids to grow up there also, he said: “I didn’t want to raise my kids in a South Central LA rough environment.”

The last 25 years, Fantroy has lived in East Multnomah County or Gresham. Now that he’s retired from his Parks & Rec position, he said he is maintaining the job he loves. And that for him, “Technique is free, teaching these kids how to run fast, how to jump further, how to throw further, and how to run longer That’s gratifying, and it’s free.”