Memorabilia from Woodrow Wilson High School’s 72-year Olympic history hangs on the gymnasium walls alongside dozens of regional and state championship banners.
Alumni of the Long Beach high school have competed in every Summer Olympics since 1952, with the exception of the boycotted 1980 Moscow games.
“It's a proud moment when people walk into that gym,” said co-head track coach Neil Nelson, who is himself a Wilson alum.
High jumper Rachel Glenn is the 32nd Bruin Olympian and joins fellow alumni and second-time Team USA water polo player Max Irving in Paris.
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- Men’s water polo: The U.S. will face Hungary in the bronze medal match at 1:35 a.m. PT on Sunday, August 11. | Follow Max Irving
- Women’s high jump: Rachel Glenn did not advance past the qualification round. | Follow Rachel Glenn
- Medal reallocation ceremony: Ten Olympians will receive their rightful medals during a Friday, August 9 ceremony at Champions Park. | Follow Lashinda Demus
- Here's how to keep up with the Paris Olympics.
Wilson High Olympians have competed in a broad range of sports from aquatics, to volleyball, track, and field.
“They've been the beneficiary of sort of that diversity of the Long Beach sports world —you do have people from every economic spectrum,” said longtime reporter Mike Guardabascio. “You do have people from every race and class.”
The school has reportedly produced more summer Olympians than any other in the U.S. LAist reached out to the United States Olympic Committee for confirmation, but they’re understandably a bit busy right now.
“Both the definition of Olympian can be vague and the people's connection to the high school can be vague,” said Guardabascio, who co-founded The 562, a nonprofit sports and education newsroom.
For example, Wilson also tracks alumni that served as physicians, coaches, and referees.
Guardabascio said the school’s Olympic record is accepted— and celebrated— as fact within Long Beach.
“Even in a city that's had so much athletic success in other areas, they just have turned out these Olympic athletes at an incredible pace,” Guardabascio said.
Olympic lessons at Wilson High School
Wilson has been most dominant in aquatics and track and field.
Wilson water polo's reputation— which now boasts 14 Olympians— drew Max Irving to the school.
“I wasn't thinking, ‘OK, I'm going to be an Olympian', but it just made my goals of wanting to compete at the highest level in aquatics that much more tangible,” Irving told LAist.
He remembered training with varsity athletes as an incoming freshman in the summer of 2009.
“It taught me that it was OK to be in uncomfortable situations,” Irving said. “That a part of growth is being uncomfortable.”
Irving played varsity for three years and won an NCAA championship at UCLA and now plays professionally in Italy.
“The beauty of it is it's still the same game that I've been playing since I was … playing and practicing with Long Beach Wilson,” Irving said.
Irving is one of four Long Beach players on the U.S. Men’s Water Polo team this year vying to bring home the first medal since 2008 when the team won silver in Beijing.
“For us to be able to contribute and push forward the Long Beach aquatic legacy is something that we all take a lot of pride in,” Irving said.
Track stars
Including 2024 competitor Rachel Glenn, seven track and field Olympians once attended Wilson.
“When new kids come in, we tell them that this is not easy, it's one of our toughest sports on campus,” said Nelson, the track coach, who's been at the school for nearly 35 years. The program is expansive rather than exclusive and trains about 250 athletes a year.
“From day one, we don't cut kids,” Nelson said. “We had kids who never, ever ran track before that end up getting the Division I scholarships.”
Lashinda Demus, a 2001 graduate and two-time Olympic hurdler, said Wilson is where she learned how to build — and be a part — of a team.
There were group car washes to raise money and sleepovers before big rivalry meets.
“We might've not hung out together during the school day, but when it came to our team and doing team activities, we were all together— all together,” Demus told LAist.
Now Demus coaches track across town at Culver City High School.
“The more I did it, the more I just noticed how much kids are malleable and you could really impact them and kind of set them on the right path,” Demus said.
Future clout
Though she’s an NCAA, national and world champion, Demus said it’s her high school records that hold more clout with the athletes she now coaches.
“When you have something tangible to put in front of them, they're more likely to listen to you,” Demus said with a laugh.
Demus will travel to Paris next month to collect the gold medal she earned in 2012 in a historic ceremony.
The athlete who beat Demus in the 400 meter hurdles in London by less than a tenth-of-second was later disqualified for doping. Demus advocated, with the help of a lawyer, to receive her medal on an Olympic stage.
“The excitement I would have for getting a gold medal when it happened, standing on the podium, these are not the same excitement,” Demus said. “But I think that I'm excited for my family to experience something that we probably wouldn't have.”
