UWEC Athletics Hall of Fame
John Schuna was an NCAA indoor national shot put champion and earned All-American status all eight times he competed in the NCAA indoor and outdoor shot put competition. He was a nine-time NCAA All-American, winning the NCAA indoor shot put championship his freshman year. He never finished lower than sixth place in his next seven national shot put competitions, including three thirds. He also placed once in the discus in national competition. At the conference level, Schuna won two golds in the shot put with two seconds and two thirds. He also scored points in the discus three times and the indoor weight throw once. He set the Blugold outdoor record in 2004 and the indoor shot put mark in 2005. Schuna was a WIAA state runner-up in the shot put and discus for Hudson High School where he also won three Big Rivers Conference titles and set the Hudson shot put and discus records. A good student as well, Schuna was the WIAC Indoor Track Co-Scholar Athlete winner in 2005, the same year he received Academic All-American Second Team honors. He was a two-time Blugold Super Six Winner. Blugold head coach Chip Schneider said that Schuna kept UWEC track and field relevant on the national level in his first few years as head coach. Since Schuna’s tenure, the men’s team has been a NCAA track and field power with multiple national shot put champions. Paul Conlin, himself an All-American shot putter at UW-Platteville, was Schuna’s throws coach.
Schuna graduated in 2006 with a major in kinesiology-exercise management. He obtained his master’s degree in exercise science from North Dakota State University (NDSU) in 2009 and his Ph.D. in human development/wellness from NDSU in 2012. From 2012-14, he was a Postdoctoral Researcher at Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. At the time of his induction and since 2014, he has been at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon where he was an Associate Professor of Kinesiology. He is a recognized expert in the areas of physical activity assessment, energy expenditure dynamics and theoretical body composition frameworks. He had authored or co-authored 58 peer-reviewed journal publications, 54 peer-reviewed scientific abstracts and three book chapters. He was the Program Director for the Masters of Public Health-Physical Activity Option at Oregon State.
