My dad gets really, really into things.
You might have heard of him, or met him, or heard his voice booming across the field from the stands at York Revolution games. He’s Jon Sprenkle, commonly known as Farmer Jon.
The view down the lane on my parents’ farm in West Manchester Township, set up with “hurdles” in the form of hay bales. My dad, Jon Sprenkle, tested himself by setting up his own “farmboy decathlon” on the final day of the Olympics. (Submitted)
He’s built his own guns and musical instruments, he brews his own beer, he sings in his church choir, he spent a week by himself in the Shenandoahs, and he “plays along” with whatever sporting events are in season. He’ll hop on his bike and ride York County’s biggest hills during the mountain stages of the Tour de France. He’ll grab his tennis racket when Wimbledon begins. During the 2010 Vancouver Olympics — which fell in the midst of York County’s snowiest winter in recent memory — he set up a biathlon course on one of his cornfields. You know, biathlon. Cross-country skiing, followed by target shooting. He even set up a penalty lap for when he missed a shot.
So we eagerly awaited his decision for how he was going to “play along” with the London Games. I guessed he might try the modern pentathlon to go along with the fencing he picked up a few years ago. Others guessed he’d get into shooting or maybe even archery.
But he surprised us all by choosing the decathlon. Continue reading
