2024 Hall of Fame: Drive Still Burns Brightly in Ryan Watson

Note: Fifth in a series of profiles on members of the 2024 Class of the Marcy Weston CMU Athletics Hall of Fame.

Training will make a distance runner good. An innate drive will make them great.

Ryan Watson had it during his years as a cross country/track & field standout at Central Michigan and it never left him.

Watson, who competed at CMU from 1998-2000, will be inducted into the CMU Marcy Weston Athletics Hall of Fame as part of the 2024 class in a ceremony in McGuirk Arena on Friday, Sept. 20 (6 p.m.) and then introduced at the CMU-Ball State football game at Kelly/Shorts Stadium on Saturday, Sept. 21.

He will go into the prestigious hall along with wrestling coach Tom Borrelli, basketball/baseball player Chad Pleiness, gymnast Sarah Dame, football player Eric Fisher, and volleyball player Kaitlyn (Schultz) Miller.

2024 MARCY WESTON CMU ATHLETICS HALL OF FAME CEREMONY
Date: Friday, Sept. 20, 2024
Time: 6 p.m. ET
Location: McGuirk Arena Main Floor
Admission: Free and open to the public

Watson, a native of Cedar Springs who ran at Saginaw Valley State for a year before transferring to CMU, won the 5,000- and 10,000-meter runs to earn the Most Outstanding Performer Award at the 2000 Mid-American Conference Outdoor Track & Field Championships and twice placed fifth in the MAC Cross Country Championships.

In 1998, he placed 33^rd at the NCAA Cross Country Championships to earn All-America honors, leading the Chippewas to a 20^th-place finish. A year later, he paced CMU to the MAC cross country title.

Watson majored in sports administration and minored in business as a student-athlete, and he parlayed that degree into a successful career as an analyst.

But he had an itch for something more than life behind a desk. In his 40s, he enrolled in the Michigan State Police Training Academy.

"I'm a mover and a shaker," Watson said. "I'm itching to get out at the end of the day."

The academy is no place for the faint of heart, and only the very best are accepted to undergo the grueling physical, mental and emotional training program.

"They put your through the ringer," Watson said. "It was 20 weeks of just intensity, every day. It was quite the mental and physical challenge."

He made it through, was sworn in as a state trooper, and was assigned to the Mount Pleasant State Police Post. He remained with the troops for 18 months before returning to his career as an analyst.

Today, he works for Priority Health and lives in Big Rapids with his wife, Erika. They have four kids ranging in age from 10-21.

"It's a very dangerous profession, a very demanding profession on your family," he said of law enforcement. "I wanted to come home safe at night and I wanted to be there for my family a little bit more. It wasn't hard to turn in my badge; but it was a really good experience."

Watson keeps his hand in the running game, so to speak, as the girls cross country coach at Big Rapids High School and he still runs up to five times a week. He and Erika also oversee a youth basketball program in Reed City.

Watson still has the competition bug, partaking in an occasional 5K or 10K, and the intrinsic drive never left.

Running, "teaches you discipline, it teaches you the benefits of a healthy lifestyle," he said. "Stay focused and don't give up; don't give up on your dreams. It was a dream of mind to be a troop and I went in a little bit later in life.

"It's never too late as long as you're willing and able and have a good mindset. Those things can happen. I try to instill that in my kids as best I can."

Central Michigan University Athletics

2024 Hall of Fame: Drive Still Burns Brightly in Ryan Watson

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