Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – When Oisin Leopold flips through an old photo album or reflects on his childhood memories there are two things that the City High senior always notices are present.  

Track and Field and Music.  

That’s the way it has been for as long as Leopold can recall.

“I’ve been doing track for just as long as I’ve been doing music, it’s been a dual thing together all my life,” Leopold said. “My parents started me really young with both.”

Growing up Leopold was introduced to both activities by his parents.

The passion his parents had for music and track and field was quickly passed down to Leopold.

“There has always been a record playing at home, there was always an LP on, my dad has a huge collection and I started my own, and so it started with listening to music,” Leopold said. “With track my mom’s family was all huge track people, they were all hurdlers and there are pictures of me on the Western Dubuque track when I was a little kid.”

The appreciation of music and love for track and field that Leopold developed as a youth only grew as he approached high school.

At City High he excelled in both of his passions earning a state medal in the 110 high hurdles as a junior while playing cello in symphony orchestra and being a member of the jazz band and show choir.

“He plays six or seven instruments, he sings and that’s on top of being one of the best hurdlers in the state,” City High track and field coach Mike Moore said. “He’s incredibly talented and he’s just a great kid.”

With his senior season of track and field cancelled and due to the coronavirus pandemic and his final semester at City High also cut short by COVID-19 Leopold is prepared to pursue his passions at the next level.

After graduating from City High with GPA over 4.0 Leopold will head to Northern Iowa in the fall where he plans to major in jazz studies and computer science as a member of the Panther track and field team.

“Northern Iowa, that’s a big-time program and he earned a spot there,” Moore said. “They are a legit program and for him to have the opportunity to earn a spot there is awesome. He earned it.”

Leopold has come a long way in both music and track and field since the days he got hooked on both as a child.

Listening to his father’s vinyl collection instilled the love of music in Leopold and led to piano lessons at a young age.

By the time Leopold was in high school he added guitar and cello to his list of instruments and was just as skilled in singing himself.

“My dad always played piano, we got a piano when I was very young and I started playing it and started taking lessons in first grade,” Leopold said. “I moved on to cello and guitar and I also love to sing.”

Leopold also made significant strides on the track.

A varsity squad member as a freshman and sophomore his breakthrough came last year when he placed fifth in the 110 hurdles at the Class 4A state meet in 15.12.

“I think one thing that helped me for sure transitioning into my success last year was mentally I was in a great place,” Leopold said. “Once I really believed I was capable I started performing better and better.”

Leopold was poised for even bigger things this spring.

Moore pegged Leopold as a state title contender in the 100 hurdles before the season and he backed up that claim in his only opportunity to compete.

At the Wartburg Indoor Invitational on March 3 Leopold placed second to 2019 state runner-up Deyton Love of Waterloo West in the 55 hurdles in a time of 7.64.

It was a brief look at the potential Leopold had for his senior season but it was more than enough to show that the City High senior was among the top hurdlers in the state.

“I was coming in gunning for first, that’s for sure,” Leopold said. “I had started preseason in November with lifting and running and I was ready to go. I had really focused on my conditioning this year because I felt like that’s what held me back and it all turned out to be for not but it was easier than I thought it would be to get past that.”

A standout student Leopold excelled in more than just the music rooms at City High.

He was a member of the 2020 Iowa Track Coaches Association Academic All-state after graduating with a 4.08 GPA.

“There are a little things I like about all my classes,” Leopold said. “I like my ability to be able to speak my mind in my AP Lit class and I really like calculus because it works in my brain, I can visualize it in my mind really well and physics is the same thing.”

Leopold will compete in track and field at Northern Iowa but has a plan to continue his musical career after his track and field days are done.

While Leopold would like to perform music himself he hopes to his computer science degree to land a job as a performer in addition to his performance career.

“I want to be able to perform but I know realistically financially that isn’t all that stable so the next best thing would be to be a producer,” Leopold said. “That is what the computer science is for because I want to produce. Jazz studies will give me the musical side of it and computer science will give me the technology side of it and that will help me get a real salary.”

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