David Krupala, Our Newest County Athlete of the Week, Bounces Back from Heart Surgery
La Grange High School senior David Krupala is the ideal all-around athlete. He specializes in cross-country and soccer, but plays many other sports as well. Not only is Krupala an exceptional athlete, he is a great teammate as well. This past summer, Krupala underwent heart surgery, which interfered with his ability to compete at full strength in the cross-country district championships. Therefore, he decided to forego his varsity spot to another teammate. As a result, his team still ended up winning the district championship. “My own personal hall of fame that I’d be putting together, David would be a first ballot inductee,” said boy’s cross-country head coach Chris Westall. “This year with addressing his health issues and getting an extremely serious surgery done, still coming back, making a run at the season, being at every practice, and pushing himself as much as he physically could was just amazing in and of itself. It was a big question mark going in. It didn’t turn out the way we wanted it to, but the effort was there and the valid attempt. I think it all ended in the best possible scenario in terms of the team still succeeding, David being a part of it, and he’s going to continue to be a part of it as we all go to regionals.”
Krupala’s remarkable comeback has made its way to this edition’s Player of the Week.
Question: What do sports mean to you?
Answer: “Sports mean a lot. It’s definitely big to go onto the field knowing that you have competition, or to go into a race knowing that you have to compete against another school or another team. It’s nice because you wake up everyday knowing that you have to get a little bit better in order to win. Sports mean a lot to me just because of the family that it brings along. Teammates, bus rides, going through sports with them, it draws you together as a family.”
Question: What other sports have you participated in besides soccer and crosscountry?
Answer: “Cheer, gymnastics, tennis, swim team, and football.”
Question: How has your recent heart surgery given you a new perspective on life?
Answer: “It’s definitely set me back a lot of notches. I came out of surgery expecting to be right back with it 100% and that’s not really what happened. I set my expectations a little high for my recovery. It’s taken me a long time to get back to what I’m used to doing.”
Question: How does being on the soccer team help you perform in cross-country and vice versa?
Answer: “It’s nice because soccer and cross-country go so hand in hand. Both are so running intensive that the workouts for one are also the workouts for the other. We’ll run miles in cross-country and then go repeat the same workouts in soccer. It’s nice to get a head start on my soccer conditioning for crosscountry and vice versa.”
Question: How did your teammate react when you told him you were giving him your varsity spot on the cross-country team?
Answer: “I always knew going into it that time consistency was going to be the one determining factor of the varsity spot After I told my team that I would be willing to give up my spot, they were surprised. In anybody else’s shoes, I don’t know if they would’ve done the same thing. They saw it for what it was. They would’ve expected nothing else of anybody else on the team.”
Question: Can you describe how you’ve been feeling since your recent heart surgery?
Answer: “It’s been weird. Overall, tiredness has reigned through all of my workouts. I’m so much slower than I used to be. I can’t breeze through daily athletic workouts like I normally did. I find myself putting much more effort into workouts to get back to where I used to be.”
Question: What kind of thoughts went through your mind as you were getting such an important surgery done?
Answer: “It was just chaos. My surgery was pushed back because of COVID-19. The hospitals had to prioritize care. Since my surgery wasn’t 100% urgent, it was pushed back later and later, which was nice because it relieved a lot of the original stress that I had felt and it pushed it off to a little bit later. Overall, I knew I wanted to get back out of the slump as quick as I could. I wanted to get back into things, so it really drove me through surgery and recovery knowing that the faster I could get through recovery, rehab, and physical therapy, the faster I could get back to doing what I love.”
Question: Can you describe the process of making the decision to give up your spot on the varsity cross-country team?
Answer: “The process is fairly simple. I know I wanted the spot to go to whoever deserved it. In that case, it just wasn’t me. Coach had a heart-to-heart with me a few times after practice. He told me, ‘David, I know you’re a big runner on this team. You’re a legacy member, you’ve been here all four years, you’ve pushed the team throughout, and you are a senior. So it’s your ability to take that spot if you want it If you believe that you can make a difference for this team.’ In the end, I decided it wasn’t my spot to take.”
Question: What would you say has been the hardest part about your recovery?
Answer: “The hardest part has been how slow it’s been. I expected to wake up out of recovery and the next day get right back to playing soccer, running, tumbling, and stuff like that. The realization quickly set in on paperwork when they said no hard tumbling was allowed, no cheering, anything for around three months. That was pretty difficult because I couldn’t jump back into workouts. I had to start walking around my living room, then I was able to walk a mile. After that, I was able to jog. Then I could start tumbling and stuff like that”
Question: What are some things about you that make you a good athlete?
Answer: “I would say probably my effort and discipline. Likely faith along with that A lot of the time, it’s my effort that I’m pushing throughout workouts. The discipline to go to workouts every day no matter what makes me the athlete that I am.”
Krupala sets the precedent that you can do anything you set your mind to and emphasizes how valuable teammates can actually be.