In a sense, Tigers coach Larry Padilla doesn't need any hardware to show what kind of season he's just had. In his runners' eyes, he's already a winner.

The blue-eyed, silver-haired veteran of 19 years with the school has been fighting prostate cancer since it was being diagnosed in the spring. To date, he has not missed a single practice or meet.

Most days you can find him out on the course with his kids. He may have lost a step or two during the last few months, but he never uses his illness as an excuse.

In fact, the word "excuse" isn't even in Padilla's vocabulary.

"People talk all the time about needing something or not needing something," he says. "Me, I didn't need to feel bad enough that I couldn't do what I wanted. I didn't need to feel the pain. ... I decided I didn't need to have any of those awful things affect me."

Make no mistake, the rigors of treating his illness are not pleasant. The 60-year-old has gained about five pounds - "It feels like a lot to me," he says - and he has learned, albeit reluctantly, to drop his inhibitions about personal privacy during endless rounds of radiation treatment in Albuquerque.

"There's a lot of things that go through the mind when you hear a scary word like cancer," Padilla says. "You wonder if it's time to start saying goodbye to everyone you love, if it's time to update your will. I didn't know anything about prostate cancer and that was probably the worst part about all of it. I didn't really know what I was facing."

Good thing Padilla has plenty of experience overcoming traumatic events.

In 1986 he nearly shot off his left foot in a hunting accident. Two years ago he broke his hip and pelvis when the scaffolding he was standing on collapsed beneath him.

Funny thing is - each of the three major medical maladies in his life have made him stronger.

When doctors considered amputating his left foot after a shotgun blast ripped off his heel and Achilles' tendon, he insisted on a second opinion. Six long weeks later, a surgeon from California repaired the damage. One year later, Padilla ran a mile for the first time.

The broken hip and pelvis was so bad that some thought Padilla would never run again, let alone walk without a limp. Two months later (against doctors wishes, of course) he was out pounding the pavement once again.

Thus it should come as no surprise that a thing like cancer will slow this man down.

"He's an inspiration to everyone around him," Los Lunas athletic director Albert Aragon says. "I think what it shows to the kids is you can go on after something like that."

When Aragon recalls the day he first heard of Padilla's condition, he naturally assumed the coach would be taking an indefinite leave of absence.

"Never once did he say anything about taking time off," Aragon says. "He just came in here, told me what was going on and said he still intended to coach."

Padilla was coaching the Los Lunas track and field team when his diagnosis came down. "I wasn't sure if I was going to tell (the kids) at first," Padilla says. "Then one day we were out running. We stopped halfway through to do some stretching and that's when I just laid it out there."

The reaction was somewhat predictable. Most kids were silent, some asked a few cautiously worded questions. Some kids eventually wrote letters and sent their own versions of get-well gifts.

It all served as a welcome reprieve from the daily routine of facing his latest battle.

The long-term prognosis is still in doubt. Of course, none of it really phases Padilla.

"I'm getting through it," he says. "I've just decided I don't need to feel the pain right now. I want to go on, and that's the decision I'm living with."