Your inbox approves Men's coaches poll Women's coaches poll Play to win 25K!
RIO 2016
Carlin Isles

Speedy Carlin Isles embraces his chance in rugby

Martin Rogers
USA TODAY Sports

LOS ANGELES — Carlin Isles runs like someone is trying to take something away from him and lives the rest of his life that way too.

Isles, who stands as the speediest man in the world of rugby after a remarkable personal and professional journey through childhood struggles, foster care, the U.S. track and field trials, an NFL tryout and soon the Olympics, has learned to take nothing for granted.

USA rugby athlete Carlin Isles will play in the Rio Olympics where rugby sevens will make its debut.

“Everything that has happened has been like a dream,” Isles said. “But if something can go perfectly right, if you’re not careful it can go perfectly wrong too. That’s what I’m guarding against, every day.”

Rugby is returning to the Olympics after a long hiatus. Remarkably, the USA is the defending champion, having won gold in Paris in 1924. But just as modern rugby is virtually unrecognizable from the plodding, direct sport played nearly a century ago, so too is rugby sevens — the condensed version that will be used in Rio de Janeiro — a different beast altogether from the regular form of the game.

Sevens, as its name suggests, uses just seven players per side as opposed to the typical 15. That leads to wide-open spaces and great opportunities for the quickest of players. Players such as Isles, a former track and football star at Ashland University whose best 100-meter times would have been good enough for a semifinal spot at the 2012 Olympics.

“Unfortunately for me, in track I come from the strongest sprinting nation on earth,” Isles said. “That has made it hard to break through in track, but it has also given me this crazy opportunity in rugby.”

Transitioning into rugby was a path Isles, 26, ventured down in 2012, and the rest is history. He is regarded as the quickest sevens player in the world, his pace providing a devastating weapon for the U.S. team.

“When I first heard about rugby and what it involved, it seemed made for me,” Isles said. “I started having these thoughts like, what if I could become the Usain Bolt of rugby? What if I could become known around the rugby world? What if I got to represent my country? What if I got a Nike contract? And somehow it all happened.”

However, don’t expect rugby’s ultimate speedster to take his foot off the pedal. He is too cautious for that, reticence bred from his difficult upbringing. His last memory of his birth mother is of seeing her taken away in a police car. When he was a young boy, Isles and twin sister Tambra bounced around various foster homes. He says they had to eat dog food to stave off hunger on more than one occasion.

Life changed dramatically when the pair were adopted by Starlett and Charles Isles just before they turned 8.

In high school, Isles would look to atypical sources of inspiration, aware of his physical gifts, wary of wasting them. When former Ohio State standout running back Maurice Clarett became embroiled in a series of high-profile legal and disciplinary disputes, Isles began cutting newspaper clippings of “anybody who messed up who had a gift.”

Isles’ speed made him a natural for kickoff and punt returns in college, with some spectacular results in his three years at Division II Ashland.

“He was just so fast that he could run around everyone,” Ashland head coach Lee Owens said. “We drew a play up where we pitched it to Carlin and told him to circle the defense, and he could do it. He’s the only one I’ve ever seen on a kick return — he would circle in and run 200 yards for an 80-yard kickoff return and never lose his stride. It’s ridiculous how fast he was.”

That gift has not escaped the NFL’s attention, and Isles tried out with the Detroit Lions in 2014. NFL teams continue to monitor him, and Isles says he would like to test himself on the gridiron again. He also has not ruled out a return to track, participating in the U.S. indoors championships this year. Suddenly, he might be in danger of having too many options.

“It is great to dream big, but it is very, very difficult to do one of these sports at a high level, let alone both,” U.S. coach Mike Friday said. “There are parts of Carlin’s rugby game that can still improve, and this is the time to do that work and take those steps.”

“I think regardless of the sport he’ll be successful,” Owens said. “I don’t know rugby or track and field like I know football, but I think the coaches of those sports are going to tell you the same thing. A lot of people waste their talent because they don’t have the work ethic it takes to be at the Olympic level, (but) Carlin does.”

The USA finished sixth in the HSBC Sevens World Series, and Isles will be a crucial part of the squad’s attempts at Olympic success.

“A medal is a good and appropriate goal for us,” Isles said. “That why I came into rugby, to play in the Olympics and try to win a medal. That’s what we are capable of.”

USA TODAY Sports counts down to the Rio Olympics with profiles on 10 of the Games biggest stars. 

Featured Weekly Ad