A coach’s lessons for life, death

C.F. Bakker's example, strength of character led thousands to improve their health.

To get reluctant athletes moving, C.F. Bakker never bothered with pep talks, hand holding, barking orders or bribery.

At the Carl E. Sanders Family YMCA in Buckhead, where he worked as a fitness coach for 10 years, he rarely raised his voice and never berated members. But if they wanted matter-of-fact wisdom for healthy living, they knew where to find him.

His straightforward manner helped about 1,000 people each year change their ways, to get ahead of idleness and infirmity. Sedentary seniors began walking to their mailboxes. Businessmen rebounded from heart attacks. Frail churchgoers began standing up in their pews without help.

When it came to dying, friends and students would have understood if their coach wavered. But his plain tone and focus on the task at hand remained unchanged, even as he dealt with inoperable liver cancer.

On Monday, nearly three years after his diagnosis, C.F. Bakker died at age 67. By then, those he had tutored had learned to move ahead on their own. His teaching helped them to say their goodbyes.

A heartfelt tribute

Two weeks before his death, on Nov. 3, there was a cold rain falling, but 150 members of the Sanders Y turned out for an event they called the “Pay It Forward” party. A large banner, valentines and a cake with a rainbow celebrated Bakker and the power of investing in someone else, no payback required.

“Your inspiration made me lose 25 lbs !!!” one person wrote on the banner.

The guest of honor and his wife, Julie, sat beneath a bouquet of red and white balloons. Nearby was a table where those on hand could sign up to deliver meals to his home. Bakker had always pestered members to sign in before exercising; now here was a chance to sign up to help him.

“We’re done being respectful,” Y group vice president Kristin McEwen teased Bakker in her remarks. “It’s time for us to show him how much we love him.”

Most everyone he worked with knew that Bakker (rhymes with locker) had once been in their shoes, struggling to head in the right direction himself.

He had nearly passed out his first time on a treadmill and wanted to quit. Instead, he quit smoking and drinking, and rid himself of 55 pounds. Soon he was winning his age group in triathlons.

“We’re not hiring you for your expertise,” McEwen recalled saying when Bakker joined her staff. “We’re hiring you for your character.”

Others testified about how that character had rubbed off on their lives. They called him a curmudgeon and grumpy old man who looked and sounded like Col. Sherman T. Potter from the TV show “M*A*S*H.”

Jack Watts recalled Bakker once interrupting a basketball game this way: “Young men, at the YMCA, ‘mother’ is not a hyphenated word.”

Senior citizens from the nearby Agape Center, where he volunteered, said Bakker motivated them to get up and make their beds, to lift their arms above their heads. The crowd applauded one who demonstrated how, after Bakker’s help, she could kick waist-high.

Men made strong through Bakker’s coaching paused during their stories to swallow tears.

Bill Bloom gave Bakker a triathlon medal he’d earned thanks to his training, something he’d achieved despite heart and shoulder issues.

Paul Marshall talked about the strength he felt watching Bakker’s refusal to weaken from cancer.

“I think about how tough it is to wake up [early] every morning,” Marshall told him at the gathering. “I think about you and if [you] can do it, I should do it.”

‘I am not giving up’

A few days later, in his office at the Y, Bakker said he’d enjoyed the “living wake.” He admired the turnout, doubting a crowd that big would attend his funeral. Doctors had told him that was likely not far off.

Still, the father of two and grandfather of two said he felt better than he had in months, despite so many troubling signs.

Chemotherapy was failing to curb his tumor’s growth. Flaring chest pains, caused by the spread of cancer to his heart, sometimes sent him to the ER. His 5-foot-7 frame now carried only 145 pounds.

“My best weight is around 160,” he said. That’s where he was in February 2008, after his triathlon season had been a disappointing bust. Where was his usual energy?

He saw the doctor and found the answer. Tests showed cancer at the center of his liver, and growing.

“No way I can tell you that you are in anything but trouble here,” Bakker recalled him saying.

He never considered quitting the Y. He felt an obligation to keep coaching. But there something he had to sacrifice: competition.

“I wish I could make this a better story by still getting out and running triathlons,” he said, “but there would be a good chance of me drowning.”

Instead, he had planned his cremation, signed a living will and begun working on details of his memorial service.

“Quite frankly, since I know I am going to heaven, the dying part is not something that disturbs me terribly,” he said. “But I am not giving up, especially not visibly, because it’s not good for my wife or anyone to see that.”

Before the Y, Bakker had taught high school social studies and English. He had studied his favorite teachers and copied their strengths. Mostly, he guided his students by listening to their dreams.

“You’re having a great deal of influence, whether you know it or not, in someone’s life,” he said. “You could be setting a terrible example, and that’s also setting an example. A good example has a lot to do with honesty, integrity and stuff like that. That’s what I have tried to do.”

His spirit survives

Just days after that conversation, Bakker became disoriented at work and left the Y for good. Hospice was called in. Twelve days after the party celebrating his life, he was dead.

“He was surrounded with an overwhelming amount of love and he passed peacefully,” the Y’s McEwen wrote in an e-mail to friends.