For most of us, watching sports at Stanford is a simple affair in which we can lose ourselves in the wins and losses of the moment and the thrill of the competition taking place before our eyes. It’s no secret that our university boasts some of the top athletic teams in the nation — 13 straight Directors’ Cup wins can attest to that — and the sheer number of teams that contribute to those titles is a good reason why there is nearly always some athletic event on campus offering spectators a view of one of the finest all-around programs in the country.

But there is another side to the Stanford sports scene that often goes unnoticed. For every Cardinal squad, there is a trainer assigned to make sure that student athletes are not only competing to the best of their abilities, but are also receiving the necessary treatment for the injuries that afflict members of a team over the course of a season. It is their job to not only help the Cardinal athletes heal, but also to make sure that they do not hurt themselves more seriously or even permanently.

Perry Archibald has seen a lot in his 22 years as an athletic trainer for Stanford, having worked with almost every sport at one point or another. He is currently assigned to the Cardinal soccer and wrestling teams, and knows firsthand the complications which come from a job description that often calls for him to tell athletes to ease up, when their entire lives of competition have conditioned them to push on.

“I have to approach things a little differently depending on the athlete,” Archibald said. “With some guys you can be a bit more direct and they will accept it [when they’re hurt], and with other guys you have to be a little bit more convincing and you may even have to use the aid of the coach and the physician to increase the weight of what you’re saying. Sometimes they’re not even going to believe you — sometimes people need more than one person to tell them.”

His duties as the wrestling team’s trainer, in particular, have offered him a different set of difficulties. As anyone who’s attended a collegiate wrestling match can attest, the sport is often a testament to an athlete’s ability to endure pain, as joints and limbs are slowly twisted in ways they were not designed to twist. Often, coaches and trainers are left only to plead with an official to stop the action as a hold becomes dangerous.

“It’s hard for me to watch because I know if something does happen I’m going to be on the receiving end, trying to take care of whatever results from it,” Archibald said. “The one sport that I did do through high school and into college was wrestling, so I did participate in that even if I wasn’t any good at it, I feel as though I know something about the sport, and I understand about different kinds of holds that people get put in.

“[There are] legal, control holds in wrestling and then there are things which are illegal, and we try and stop the official when a hold which is legal looks like it might become illegal.”

As Archibald explained, the fact that his work occurs outside of the spotlight does not really bother him, even given the obvious importance and duty in keeping athletes healthy and safe in their competitions.

“I really enjoy my job, I really enjoy working here,” he said. “This is a job, you do it for love, you don’t do it for money. I don’t do it for prestige anymore — I’ve been a trainer at higher levels than here, I was a trainer with the San Francisco Giants at one time — and I do enjoy working with the kids and the coaches. When I was younger, I kind of had that thought that, you know, ‘I want to be the best trainer and I want everybody to know,’ that kind of stuff, but not anymore.

“All I care about is just taking care of the athletes.”

And as long as there are people watching and competing in sports, there will always need to be trainers keeping the action going.