At the Pacific-10 Conference Championships two weeks ago, the high jumper and the hammer thrower exchanged loud cries across the mostly silent infield of the Mooberry Track in Pullman, Wash.
“People were like, ‘What are you yelling at?’” the hammer thrower said.
Then the hammer thrower finished the pesky business of winning his event and went over to the high jump bar, where he watched his sister notch a personal best in her own specialty.
“Then I go over to cheer for her, and they’re like, ‘Oh, they’re family.’”
Family. Adam and Rachael Kriz, the Oregon junior hammer thrower and the Oregon sophomore high jumper, respectively, though those definitions hardly begin to label them. Adam throws discus and shot put, Rachael dabbles in javelin. Growing up in Toledo, Ore., both were multi-sport athletes with a multitude of hopes for college and beyond.
But Adam is a hammer specialist, and today he will throw at the NCAA Championships in Baton Rouge, La. The event caps a remarkable 2002 campaign for both Adam and Rachael, the first family — numbers-wise — of Oregon track.

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Adam and Rachael arrived at Oregon in entirely different ways. Rachael, addicted to track since the seventh grade, knew early that she was Eugene-bound.
“My coach was always saying, ‘Well, the Ducks are known for track,’” Rachael said. “From then on I kind of kept my eye on U of O. Then when I hit high school I was like, ‘I need to go to U of O.’”
Rachael attended Oregon’s track camp after the first three years of high school, sessions that only heightened her love for Hayward Field. When the recruiting letter finally came, Rachael didn’t think, she just signed on with head coach Tom Heinonen.

But Adam’s trip to Hayward was much rockier than his sister’s. He was presented with a choice: face possible rejection as a walk-on at Oregon, or take a near-sure scholarship at Southern Oregon.
“I had the application for Oregon and the application for Southern sitting next to each other on the table,” Adam said. “I thought Oregon represented the best of the best. Southern Oregon was not the best of the best, but I had a pretty good shot at getting a scholarship there. Then I remember I heard this song, and it was ‘Bittersweet Symphony,’ and I went ‘Yep, I’m going to Oregon.’ That decided it for some reason.”
Bittersweet, indeed, that Rachael ended up in Eugene because of sheer love, and Adam ended up here because of sheer luck. But in their own ways, the brother and sister became true Ducks.

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Adam, of course, ended up making the team as a hammer thrower, despite his small size. He took a redshirt year to beef up, worked on technique and soon built his status as a top thrower in the program.
In his first season focusing solely on the hammer — though he’s continued to “mess around,” as he called it, in the shot put and discus — Adam took eighth at the Pac-10 meet. As a sophomore, he took fourth.
This year he won it.
“It’s been incredible to watch Adam (improve),” Rachael said. “I’d love to walk in that guy’s footsteps.”
Rachael has also improved in her two years here, in small ways. She capped a disappointing freshman season with an 11th-place finish at the Pac-10s. She flirted with her personal best of 5 feet, 7 and 1/4 inches several times throughout the season, but never hit the big height.
She experienced similar frustration through much of this season, missing again and again at the big heights. Then, toward the end of the year, she went back to her high school roots, messed around, had fun. At the Oregon Twilight meet, she threw the javelin just for kicks. She went to the Pac-10s the next week and, not coincidentally, hit a new personal best in the high jump at 5-7 1/2.
“Doing one event was killing me,” Rachael said. “I need to be doing more than just one thing. The javelin is such a fun event for me. I miss those events where I can go 100 percent on each one and know that I’m not going to have to save anything for later on.”
For Rachael, it seems, walking in her brother’s footsteps may not be so difficult after all.

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Adam has come a long way since his days as a freshman, when he said he was afraid of not making the Duck squad. Today he stands proud at the NCAA Championships, where he said he will be more relaxed than ever.
“This is gravy from here on out,” Adam said. “There’s nothing to worry about. At Pac-10s there was a lot pressure on me. If we stood a chance of getting a team title I needed to start off with that 10 points. This week there’s no pressure. I’m ranked 13th. Nothing’s expected of me. I can just sit back and try to get a big mark.”
Adam won’t have Rachael to holler at him in Baton Rouge, she’s staying home for a cousin’s wedding this weekend.
It’s fitting that Rachael will miss Adam’s performance for another family member, though she said “Adam knows” the entire Kriz family will be willing him to do well.
Fitting. And perhaps even bittersweet.