Wharton's David Mitchell, Local Hero

For this month's Local Hero spotlight, we take a look at David Mitchell.

Mitchell is a teacher at He is also the head wrestling coach, the head football coach, and an assistant track coach at the school. Additionally, he is a coach at a local wrestling club called the New Tampa Wildcats, he is a coach for the Florida national wrestling team and, oh, he teaches Sunday school.

"I usually have free time one week before school starts," said Mitchell.

Once school starts, he is five days a week after school for football. Wrestling starts toward the end of football and runs over the holiday break and into the next year. Wrestling goes until February when track and field start up. Track and field runs into early-mid summer when club wrestling is in full swing. Club wrestling and summer football overlap and spill into the next school year and, just like that, a whole year goes by.

"I'm very blessed to have a good wife who understands the things I do," Mitchell said.

But still, how does he do it?

"I get a thrill training and helping kids train, and then see them become successful," he said.

Training, and training kids, is something that's been a part of Mitchell from the beginning. He is a graduate of Leto High School but cites PE coach Phil Zimmerman, then a teacher at Webb Junior High School, with getting him involved in wrestling and inspiring him to teach. Mitchell attended Yankton College in South Dakota where he wrestled at 142 pounds, was a wide receiver on the football team and ran the 110-meter high hurdles in track.

He coached football and track at his alma mater, Leto, when he moved back to Tampa. However, Hillsborough County built Wharton High School in 1997 and brought in Mitch Muley as principal. That was enough to get Mitchell to move to New Tampa.

Mitchell is what is affectionatley referred to by Wharton faculty as a "lifer," or one who has been with the school all 15 years. Mitchell has also been on the football coaching staff for 15 years, seven years as head coach, 15 years as head wrestling coach and 15 years on the track staff.

"We really have a good nucleus of coaches at Wharton," said Mitchell. "We work together and we share athletes. Some schools make their kids focus on one sport; we help each other."

It must be easier to promote sharing when you coach three different sports.

"I even help out Tonelli (the boys basketball coach) when he does his basketball camp in the summer," said Mitchell.

There's obviously a sense of sharing that goes on at Wharton. And based upon his multitude of duties, Mitchell shares about 75 percent of his life with Wharton High School and the New Tampa community.