Scholastically Speaking

As a kid, Juliana once broke her left arm four times within 18 months, all as a result of trying to keep up with her older brother and only sibling, Clint. “I love sports, always have,” she says. “Anything competitive.” That competitive drive would lead her to accumulate 13 high school varsity letters in just about every imaginable sport, all the while exceeding in the more studious pursuits as well. She wrapped up high school just shy of a 4.0 grade point average, putting her in the top five of her graduating class.

“Math and science were my strong areas. Math has always been very easy for me. My math teacher used to joke whenever I’d come in and see him, saying ‘Okay Juliana, what’d you find wrong with the book this time?’”

She once pondered becoming either an astronaut or an insurance agency number cruncher. Now out of high school, the choices were overwhelming. “I didn’t know what to do. It was a big, big decision.” Taking the path of least resistance, Juliana followed brother Clint’s lead and attended Grinell, a private liberal arts college in Iowa. “I was very intimidated by the other students. I went into college scared to death, thinking I wasn’t smart enough to be there. I put a lot of pressure on myself, and looking back on it, it was ridiculous.”

“I had been dating a guy named Mark Staudt for a couple of years and he stayed at home, living with mommy and going to a local two-year college. We tried to stay together, but he was jealous of my independent, co-ed living situation away at school.” Bowing to his pressuring and her own collegiate insecurities, Juliana transferred back home after her freshman year, opting to enroll at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls. “I still think that’s one of the biggest mistakes I’ve ever made -- transferring because of my boyfriend. It feels like that was my biggest failure in life.”

Settling in at UNI for the rest of her undergrad years, Juliana completed three majors and one minor under a shower of scholarships. Heaps of studying pushed sports to the background, but her competitive drive would soon resurface.

“I played softball and basketball at Grinell, but didn’t even try at UNI. That’s one of the reasons I was so ready for disc golf. I started playing my senior year, and I had gone for two years without any competitive sports.” Then, in the fall of 1992, fate took her on a class field trip.

A New Passion Is Born

“In my geology classes there was a guy named Jason Steffen who had been playing pro for years. Everything he talked about was disc golf, and he was always trying to get people out on the course. He thought I might have some ability for it and he would hound me to try to get me to play. It sounded a little iffy... I never really took it seriously. One time we went on a geology field trip and he brought his bag of discs along. I was making fun of him, asking ‘What, you can’t throw just one?’ He said ‘Okay, pick a target.’ I pointed to some evergreen trees about 400 feet away, and he landed the disc within twenty feet. Seeing the flight of the disc and the accuracy with which he threw it made me want to try it.”

Keep in mind that Juliana had little previous frisbee experience. “I’d played catch with my brother in the yard and didn’t have too much success, so I didn’t enjoy it very much. I thought I’d be terrible. Instead, I was hooked immediately.”

“Jason took me out to play on the Cedar Falls league night. Everyone there was so encouraging. I think there were three or four other women, so I wasn’t the only women out there. The guys all came up to me and thanked me for coming out, asking me to please come again. They bent over backwards to make me feel like I was in the right place.”

“Jason would give me heavy, heavy discs. I threw a 180 Scorpion for a long time. I think he was proud of the fact that I was able to throw the heavy stuff.“

A week later she played in her first tournament, finishing in second place. “I didn’t have a run-up for about two years. I threw almost like Jim Oates, who just sort of stands there. Each year I progressively entered bigger and bigger tournaments and had more and more success. I just fed on itself. The better I got, the higher my expectations got, and I would work harder at it.”

Cover Story, continued...