At first glance, Jon Wrzesinski's life after UND might appear to have followed the standard path for the UND Education and Physical Education major.  He has been a teacher, a coach and a director of athletics. However, what makes this former UND Track standout's path unique is where it has taken he and his family.
 
Wrzesinski, who transferred from the North Dakota State College of Science in Wahpeton, still holds the UND record in the Decathlon, but almost ended up in Fargo.

­"I was transitioning from NDSCS where I was a two-sport athlete, football and track, and was looking at all the options of either continuing my college football career or college track career or possibly continuing both, but the majority of the schools recruiting me were leaning towards me picking one or the other," Wrzesinski said. "Ironically, I made the decision to sign with NDSU for track. On my official visit I was ready to sign but NDSU did not have the letter of intent or scholarship papers completed. I believe it was that night or very shortly after I received a call from UND Football Coach Roger Thomas offering me a full scholarship for football and the opportunity to compete in track and field from Coach Mke Grandall. The rest is history."
 
Following graduation, Wrzesinski was hired as an assistant football coach and admissions counselor at NDSCS.  He continued to train with hopes of qualifying for the Olympic trials decathlon.  NDSCS moved Jon to Bismarck to recruit western North Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming. While in Bismarck, he contacted Tom Petrik, a former UND standout athlete and Head Track Coach at U Mary about training with his athletes. That contact turned into not only an opportunity to continue to train, but also a graduate assistant position at Mary. He became the Head Cross Counrty, Head Indoor Track and Associate Head Outdoor Track Coach and Assistant Football Coach as well as landing a teaching position in the Physical Education Department.

"I was a decathlete and had hopes of qualifying for the 1992 Olympic Trials. I knew I wasn't good enough to make the Olympic team but reaching the trials was my goal. I fell short of that goal. I could come up with excuses but the bottom line was probably I just was not good enough. I was competitive against college kids in open events such as the pole vault, hurdles, and sprints while I was training and coaching at Mary, and I think I scored around 7400 points in the decathlon, but that still was not enough to hit the qualifying score for the trials."

For you multi-event fans, this was the Dan and Dave era (who NIke made famous with a marketing campaign leading up to the Barcelona Olympiad). Enough said. Jon jokingly says, "I think I may still hold some track records at UND which really means the current track coaches need to do a better job of recruiting," 
 
After three years at Mary where he met his wife Michele, Jon decided that coaching and teaching at the University level was not for him, so he took a job back in his wife's hometown of Harlowton, Mont. The Wrzesinski's spent ten years in Harlowton teaching and coaching where they started a family, son Cleet and daughter Wrenzi.  While at Harlowton, they turned the football and track programs into perennial powers, helping provide the foundation for student-athletes to receive college athletic scholarships. 

"We were getting restless career-wise and had accomplished what we set out to do in Harlowton," he said. "I started looking at overseas options after visiting with a coaching friend (Jim McElwain, former Head football coach at CSU and the University of Florida), that happened to have family that taught Internationally. The kids were young and just starting school so the timing was right for us all to do something different."
 
Something different was an understatement.

"We left Harlowton sometime in the early 2000's, (the older I get the less importance I place on specific dates primarily because I don't remember them) and moved to Islamabad, Pakistan where I was the Athletic Director and Michele taught physical education at The International School of Islamabad," he recalled. "So many fond and wonderful memories of the country and the people we met in our two years there that we could write a book on those two years. The next stop was Shanghai, China for eight years at the prestigious Shanghai American School teaching PE and coaching cross country and track. Culturally, the experiences of living in Asia for ten years in a Muslim country and eight years in a communist country are invaluable. The schools we worked in had kids from all over the world attending them. We were exposed to many cultures. When we tell people we lived in these places the first thing they ask is how we learned Urdu or Chinese so fast to be able to teach. The kids in these schools are all fluent in English and many other languages. They had to be or they would not be admitted into our school. They are essentially private prep schools where the main goal of the students and their families was to get into the top Universities throughout the world, mainly in the U.S. In China, we were not allowed to have any Chinese students holding passports in our school as it was against the Chinese Government's rules. We had kids from over fifty different countries enrolled at SAS with the majority coming from the States.
 
"Cleet finished his freshman year at SAS and we always knew that if we wanted our kids to be successful in high school sports and increase their chances of athletic scholarships, we would have to move back to the U.S. and expose them both to much better competition. You can probably see a theme here in regards to the importance we placed on sport. The reality is we always stressed strong academics and that was a given. They knew they were expected to be good, polite, respectful, caring students and work hard in the classroom .It was what they did outside the classroom that would separate them from their peers. Both are honor students all through elementary and high school and fluent in Mandarin."
 
After ten years in Asia the family moved back to Montana and left the overseas gig behind (temporarily). Jon and Michele wanted to provide their kids with coaching and the facilities for them to be successful at the high school level back in the States. Jon was a Principal and a Superintendent so could pick where they wanted to live and work.

"Rural Montana was important to Michele and my up-bringing so we targeted that area," he said. "Montana has a great sports culture, much like North Dakota, where everyone knows everyone and if you want to compete against the best in your state regardless of classification, you can do that." 
 
Cleet and Wrenzi were both highly successful track and field athletes in Montana and highly recruited by NCAA DI schools as well as NAIA schools. 

"As former college athletes and coaching parents we learned long ago to not let your personal egos dictate where your kids go to university and help your kids to make decisions that would give them the best chance to be successful on the national stage," Wrzesinski said.

Both chose Dickinson State because of the family's familiarity with the coaches and the history of the programs. 

"DSU did a great job of recruiting them, plus they have a lot of Montana ties at DSU, which meant a great deal of support for both which was very important as we knew we would be living 10 months out of the year back in Asia," he noted
 
That's right, Jon and Michele are back in Asia. This time they are in Vietnam where Michele is teaching and Jon is the Activities Director at Saigon South International School.
 
Spoken as a proud parent, Jon says Cleet's experience at DSU has been successful and enjoyable. He is already a four-time All American multi-event athlete and has a good chance of becoming a national champion. Wrenzi hopes to follow his lead and forge her own path to success at DSU.
 
When asked about who he considers his mentors Jon says "My high school track coach John Cheek who is a legend in track in Montana and my dad who was my football and wrestling coach all through high school. In college, I had many mentors in my playing and competing days as well as my coaching days and they all played a part in how I live my life to this day,"
 
Jon recalled one moment in particular at the end of his first year on the UND Football team:

"One of my most profound memories of UND football was after my junior year when you have those sit downs at the end of the season with the head coach. Roger Thomas was my coach at the time. He flat out told me he did not know if I was good enough to play at UND. That caught me a bit off guard because I never really got the chance to play much my junior year (my first year at UND coming off two years at NDSCS). In my mind I was thinking, how does he know how good I am because he never gave me a chance besides special teams."
 
Jon was also playing behind Track All-Americans and eventual UND Hall of Fame inductees Norm McGee and Traci Martin.

"To make a long story short, when spring ball rolled around I made sure to prove him wrong and never dropped a ball or messed up an assignment," he recalled.

This was in addition to earning All-America honors in track. Jon was the No. 1 receiver going into the fall where he ended up the leading receiver in the NCC and named First Team All-Conference.

"So, if you're reading this Coach Thomas, thanks for calling me out." 
 
Jon still keeps in sporadic touch with former teammates Tom Demars and Rusty Ekness and old roommates Rory Beil and Norm McGee.

"I see some of my old coaches on Facebook and had the pleasure of seeing Coach Clay on Cleet's recruiting trip a few years back. I returned to watch the UND/Montana football game last year (Go Sioux) and got to visit with Coach Grandall." 
 
 When asked how experiences as a UND student-athlete became applicable to his life after he left UND Jon said: "UND gave me the opportunity to pursue a passion for the two sports I didn't want to give up from high school and junior college. I loved competing and knew it was a way to pay for my education and open up doors to my future in the teaching and coaching profession. I owe a lot to my teammates and coaches during my short time at UND. I had the opportunity to be a successful dual-sport athlete and wear the ND.  I am a Fighting Sioux and will always have a strong distaste (but respect) for that team to the South.
 
"My life has always involved competitive sports and that is what I enjoy. Of course, travel is a passion and living the lifestyle that we do feeds that desire. I have been extremely fortunate to take the vacation of a lifetime every year, sometimes twice a year that we have been overseas. I also like to hunt and fish when I get the chances, but I pretty much fulfill that interest vicariously through my buddies that are still avid sportsmen."
 
Jon's advice for current UND student-athletes is this: "Be very proud to wear the ND, many athletes before you laid the foundation for what you now represent. And any old teammates, coaches, or friends, If you are ever in the Saigon neighborhood, look me up at the Saigon South International School. Cheers!"
 

Dick Clay recently retired after a distinguished coaching career that spanned 34 seasons at the helm of UND's women's cross country program following the 2018-19 campaign. He also coached the men for eight years and was an associate track coach after serving as the head women's track and field coach from 1985 to 2011. He wil provide FightingHawks.com with periodical features of athletes, teams and coaches with which he worked.