Here’s an athlete to pull for

Shane Mettlen / Culpeper Star Exponent
Published: August 1, 2007

If you're looking for somebody to root for in a time when the sports world is seemingly nothing but scandals and indictments, think about checking out a Culpeper County field hockey game this fall. She may not score a goal or even get in a game this year, but Courtney Lanham deserves a standing ovation just for standing on the sidelines.

Under normal circumstances a lot would be expected from the rising senior. Lanham has started for the Devilettes each of the past three seasons. She's been an all-district player and an honor roll student. This year she should have been a star, now she's lucky to be alive.

Lanham doesn't remember how or why she wound up across the center line on McDevitt Drive on her way to work June 4. She does remember being trapped in the car for nearly an hour after the head-on collision then flown to the University of Virginia Hospital in Charlottesville where she was rushed into surgery.

Her left elbow was shattered, her left knee cap split in two and every bone in her right ankle fractured. Doctors told Lanham she might be incapacitated for nine months. Courtney envisioned a different timeline.

"I went down to the hospital to see her the night it happened," CCHS coach Peggy Allen said. "She said 'I'll be out there for hockey.'"

Right then and there her goal was set. Allen assured Courtney she would always have some sort of spot on the team, but Lanham was determined to walk onto the field Aug. 1, the opening day of tryouts.

The first month or so it was hard to imagine. With a broken knee on one leg and a destroyed ankle on the other there was no way Lanham could walk on her own and the elbow injury made using crutches next to impossible. For four weeks she was either in bed or in a wheel chair.

But with rehab sessions and sheer will the injuries began to heal. She began walking around in July and Wednesday morning at 7:30 a.m. Lanham showed up at the school for tryouts. She didn't do any running around - that left knee still looks swollen with a pair of wicked scars - but she fired off a few shots.

More importantly she realized her goal and made it to tryouts.
"It's amazing," Courtney's mother Ann Lanham said. "When I got that phone call it was my worst nightmare, but she's so glad to be out here today."

Now Courtney's goals have been adjusted and just about anything seems possible. She once had her sights set on playing for the Devilettes on Senior Night Oct. 17. Now she's thinking she might be able to take the field for a game sometime in September.

CCHS opens the season Aug. 29 at home against James Monroe. Between now and then many of the headlines and news ticker items on sports pages and stations will have something to do with steroid-enhanced sluggers, doping cyclists, gambling referees and puppy murders. It can feel like an awful time to be a fan. Sometimes it takes a teenaged field hockey player to remind us why sports captured our hearts and imaginations in the first place.

"When I was in the hospital I really didn't think I'd be here today," Lanham said, just minutes after completing the first day of tryouts. "Field hockey really motivated me and kept me going. It's everything to me and when they told me I wasn't going to play again I just couldn't let that happen."

Shane Mettlen can be reached at
825-0771 ext. 127 or .