Bouncing Around with Robert Null

Hi Jerry!

I am greatly looking forward to attending the reunion. I have a little free time now with the Olympics winding down to find time to send e-mails.

Like many people, I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life after graduating from SAHS. Although I never participated on school sport teams in high school, I found I really enjoyed several sports. I went on to graduate from Santa Ana College and CSUF with degrees in PE and a teaching credential. At CSUF, I became very involved with gymnastics, both competing and coaching. After graduation, I found public school teaching jobs hard to find so I continued coaching gymnastics in the private sector; particularly trampoline.

At the same time, I found out I looked forward to going on trips in and out of the US just for the adventure. (Probably spurred by the SAHS German Club trip to Europe in 1966 that I went on. That was an eye opener!) Anyway, I found if I coached people on trampoline to a high enough level, they would qualify to go to national and international competitions with me as a coach.

So.... 41 states, 35 countries, 28 National Championships, 13 World Championships, and 1 Olympic Games (head coach, Sydney 2000) later, I'm still coaching trampoline. I am proud to have personally coached 2 of my athletes to qualify to the last 3 Olympics. I had thoughts of retiring but I have a whole crew at the gym who are already committed for 2012 in London!

See you at the reunion,

Robert Null

Robert-It's amazing that you didn't get into this until after high school. I really like these stories, keep them coming.-Jerry