Track and field is a special sport at Carpinteria High. Head Coach Van Latham and his staff know how to run a meet efficiently. They carefully record for posterity the Warriors’ records in every meet. They are carrying on a tradition that goes back to the dawn of prep athletics in California.
In 1913, Carpinteria held a track meet pitting hometown schoolboys against Ventura counterparts. It was well received, and the next year, Mr. and Mrs. Howland Shaw Russell donated a silver cup as a prize for winning teams. The 1914 meet became known as the Russell Cup, and it has been held every year (except for a hiatus during World War II) to the present day. This Saturday, April 13, the 100th Russell Cup will take place at Carpinteria Valley Memorial Stadium.
In its long history, the meet featured five future Olympians, from Lompoc’s Nick Carter — who won the Russell Cup mile in 1920 and ran in the 1928 Games at Amsterdam — to sprinter Allyson Felix, who raced as an L.A. Baptist freshman in 2000 and went on to become the most decorated U.S. female track athlete with nine Olympic medals (six gold and three silver) from 2004 to 2016.