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Mariners Athletics

Aptos High School

Mariners Athletics

Aptos High School

Mariners Athletics


Aptos High School



Aptos High School Alumni GO MARINERS!

Sports Hall of Fame Bio.

John Kaitz

After suffering a season ending knee injury his junior year, John thought that his dreams of playing football in college ended too.  However, after a rigorous off-season rehab, John came back from that injury to not only earn Aptos High’s Most Valuable Defensive Player Award, but he also earned 1st team All-League and 1st team All-County honors as a linebacker. John also won the coveted Golden Helmet Award, as well as the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame Scholar-Athlete Award. John’s efforts on the field also earned him the Santa Cruz Sentinel’s Defensive Player of the Year Award and the SCCAL coaches’ Defensive Player of the Year Award. In addition, John’s efforts helped the Mariners win the 1982 SCCAL football championship.  John also competed in track & field. He was a three-time individual SCCAL champion, and he set the school record in the discus his senior year. He also helped the Mariners to win two SCCAL team titles. John was recruited by numerous colleges and universities for football, but in the end he chose the Golden Bears of Cal, where he played for two and a half years until he suffered another severe injury, this one truly ending his football career. However, as the football door slammed shut, another door opened. John discovered rowing at Cal. Still an athlete and a fierce competitor, John found that rowing offered him new challenges. John joined the Cal rowing team in 1986, and discovered his future. John rowed his last two years at Cal, making the varsity eights his senior year, and he loved rowing so much that he became a coach. After graduating from Cal with degrees in Kinesiology and Sports Management, John accepted the head coaching position at UCSB, where he won a national championship in 1990. John also coached at UCLA and Stanford (at UCLA, John even trained Gregory Peck in a single scull for a movie role). In addition, he has coached Masters rowing, where he has won over 30 National Championships. John was inducted into the UCSB Sports Hall of Fame as a coach. Today, John trains high performance athletes, Olympians and others, and he offers injury rehabilitation and post-rehab-recovery training. John lives in Pacifica with his wife Milda, and his two children, Mariah and Chaz –who are both rowers as well! John was presented into the Hall by his former football coach, Jim Mikaelsen.

https://aptosathletics.org