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Thomas may high-jump back into basketball
High jump world champion Donald Thomas of the Bahamas is considering leaving the sport and returning to his first love, basketball.
The 24-year-old, who played hoops at NAIA school Lindenwood University in Missouri before switching to track and field in January 2006 - three basketball games into his senior year - cleared 2.35m in Osaka at the 2007 IAAF World Championships to win the title.
After being dogged by an ankle injury during the 2008 indoor season and having a bad build-up to the Beijing Games, Thomas failed to advance beyond the qualifying round at the Olympics.
"Right now I have to decide what it is I want to do in the future, and I have several opportunities,” he said to the Freeport News in the Bahamas.
“But I will have to make the decision as to whether I continue my career in track and field or switch back to basketball. That's something I will have to decide real soon.”
It was only by chance that Thomas became a high-jumper. In January of 2006, he was eating lunch with friends in the Lindenwood school cafeteria when one of them – a high jumper – said that Thomas might be able to do well in a dunking contest but not the high jump.
Thomas once spoke of that dinner table conversation.
“Somehow the conversation came to the high jump,” he said. “One of them said I couldn't jump 6-6. I took him up on his dare."
Thomas and his friend went to the field house after lunch and he not only cleared 6ft 6in, he made it over 7ft.
Shortly after, Thomas earned a place in the track team and left basketball. Two months later, he competed for the Bahamas at the Commonwealth Games in Australia.
As Lindenwood is an NAIA school, Thomas was able to compete at Division I so he enrolled at Auburn University and high-jumped for the Tigers before capturing the world title.
Now that the Olympics are over, Thomas says there is a big downside to track and field.
"In track and field when you're injured, it's almost impossible to do anything,” he said.
“In order to compete at a high level in track and field, you really have to be healthy. And this year I just wasn't there because I was injured. Everything happens for a reason and I believe that my injury and the way I performed opened my eyes to some things."
If he decides to return to basketball, Thomas says he’ll have no trouble making the adjustment.
"I haven't played in a while, but I know that the skills are still there," he said.
"With a few practices, I could be right back where I used to be when I was playing competitive basketball."
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