Walking into the fitness center at SaddleBrooke Country Club, there is no indication the woman behind the front counter was a four-time Olympian who, for a period of 15 years, was considered the greatest American woman in her sport.
And Maren Seidler is perfectly fine with that.
The 55-year-old SaddleBrooke resident will talk about her salad days "only if you pull her teeth and force her to do so," fellow SaddleBrooke resident Janis Bottai said. "She's very humble. She does not live in her glory days, which makes her that much more endearing."
In fact, had it not been for a scheduling conflict, many of the people who see Seidler every day would have never known she recently was inducted into a second Hall of Fame for her exploits.
Seidler spent the second weekend of November in Columbus, Ohio, where at its national convention, the National Throws Coaches Association inducted her into its Hall of Fame.
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Though she had already been in the U.S. Track and Field Hall of Fame since 2000, the more recent honor moved her more because "it was designed to put the focus on just the throwing events," which Seidler believes are the least famous of the three types of track and field events.
It has been more than 25 years since Seidler last put a shot, as it is called, but she said sitting between other throwing specialists earlier this month brought back many fond memories of growing up in Brooklyn.
"I came from athletic parents, and a father who always enjoyed the throwing sports," Seidler said. "He and his buddies used to throw all their implements into a big red wagon, and I'd just traipse along after them."
Since girls sports were not offered at the schools she attended in the 1960s, Seidler knows this early exposure from dad Walter was the only way she'd have ever gotten into the sport.
"I would have never found something this unusual if I wasn't exposed to it at home," Seidler said.
The shot put, above all other throwing sports, appealed to the 6-foot-2 Seidler because "there was something just very primal about it, it was the essence of track and field. It played to my strengths."
By age 14, Seidler was competing at the highest levels in the United States.
Along the way she set 16 American records in the shot put, was the first American woman to launch the 4-kilogram steel ball beyond 60 feet, and took part in the Summer Olympics for Team USA in 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1980.
Seidler's top performance at the Olympics was an 11th-place finish in 1968 in Mexico City, when she was 17.
The last time she ever put the shot was in May of 1981, at a training session. Before that final toss, Seidler said she often wondered how a competitive athlete ever came to the realization that her time was done. Then, suddenly, she knew.
"I pushed it up and, I thought, 'This is it, I'm done,' " Seidler said.
Along with serving as the fitness coordinator at SaddleBrooke Country Club, Seidler also recently started selling real estate. She also owns a small T-shirt company, called Put-Ons.
She sells her shirts at the semiannual craft fairs held in SaddleBrooke, but this year several of her friends stepped in to do so for the fall event so Seidler could go to Ohio for her Hall of Fame induction.
"The women that I get to work with here are so good, so terrific," Seidler says. "It's such a joy for me."
PROFILE
Name: Maren Seidler.
Age: 55.
Hometown: Brooklyn, N.Y.
Athletic career: Seidler was a member of the U.S. track and field team for the 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1980 Summer Olympics, participating in the shot put. She held 16 American shot-put records at one point, and in 2000 she was inducted into the U.S. Track and Field Hall of Fame.
