It sounds like the plot to a cheesy black-and-white movie from the 1940s.

A lunk of a guy goes out to the barn behind his house every night and tosses a metal ball as far as he can. Over and over. He tries shifting his feet, turning his body in different directions, tinkering.

And, just like that, he revolutionizes the sport of shot put.

But this isn’t a Hollywood story. Ryan Crouser used his innovative “Crouser Slide” to make history at the 2024 Paris Olympics this weekend, joining a select group of athletes who have dominated their event thoroughly enough to win gold at three consecutive Games.

The 31-year-old native of Boring, Ore., called it “kind of a testament to the total dedication and hard work that has gone into it … it’s a 365-day a year job.”

With all the superstars competing here in the last few days — gymnast Simone Biles, swimmer Katie Ledecky, sprinter Noah Lyles — it might be easy to overlook Crouser. It would also be a mistake.

His story exemplifies the best aspect of the Olympics: The range of obscure and semi-obscure sports filled with athletes who devote their lives to something with no guarantee of fortune or fame.

To fully appreciate what Crouser accomplished, it helps to know more about the shot put.

The only way to heave a 16-pound ball more than 70 feet is to generate momentum by spinning your way to the release, which can be especially tricky for very large people trapped inside a seven-foot ring.

So it makes sense that, despite all their girth and grunting, shot putters tend to be science geeks.

Rather than focus on brute force, they obsess over the physics of lateral velocity, rotational radius and acceleration paths. The biomechanically optimal angle of release — 36 degrees? 38 degrees? — can be a topic for debate.

“So it’s constantly changing and evolving,” Crouser says. “Kind of under the assumption of how do we maximize potential energy creation while minimizing room for error.”

American Ryan Crouser competes in the men’s shot put final at the Paris Olympics on Saturday.

(Matthias Schrader / Associated Press)

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Throwing runs in his blood. His father, Mitch, was an alternate on the 1984 U.S. Olympic discus team and uncle Brian threw javelin at two Games. After excelling at shot put in high school, Crouser won four NCAA championships for the University of Texas.

His first gold at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games came shortly after graduation.

In a sport where many top athletes stand about 6 feet tall, Crouser uses his 6-foot-7 frame for more leverage and force on throws. But height also makes him vulnerable to committing a foul by stepping outside of that claustrophobic ring.

In his early years at the international level, he employed a fairly standard technique, working to control his body by moving precisely. In 2021, he broke Randy Barnes’ 31-year-old record with a throw of more than 76 feet at the U.S. Olympic trials, then won his second gold at the Tokyo Games.

Still, he wasn’t content.

“I feel like I experimented for a number of years just with different techniques,” he recalls. “I try to think of a rational explanation for why it would help my throw and then I’ll implement it.”

The “Fosbury Flop,” the back-roll technique made famous by Dick Fosbury at the 1968 Summer Olympics, forever changing the high jump, ranks as track’s best-known stylistic breakthrough. Though subtler, the “Crouser Slide” has been revolutionary.

Restless for something better, the self-coached Crouser searched the internet for information and applied concepts from upper-level engineering courses he took in college before switching his major to economics.

All his tinkering, spread across thousands of practice throws, led to a “light bulb moment” in that Arkansas barn in December 2022. It was about 8 p.m. and he recalls thinking “Yeah, let’s try something new just to engage myself because shot put can be extremely monotonous.”

He focused on altering the conventional starting point, which has shot putters standing at the back of the ring, facing away from the field. Crouser shifted over to the right side of the circle, creating room to his left.

The adjustment allowed him to start his motion with a quick “slide step” to the left. It made his spin a little faster and gave his right leg more space to swing around. As he explained: “Speed is king in the shot put.”

Speed can also be unwieldy, so there were problems with consistency. But within a few months, at a springtime meet in Los Angeles, he became the first man to throw beyond 77 feet.

“It’s good for the sport,” rival Tom Walsh told reporters in his home country of New Zealand. “But we’ve got to keep our end of the bar up and keep pushing him, keep challenging him, because when someone is too dominant, the sport gets a bit dull.”

During the past 10 or so years, Crouser has amassed five of the top six — and 14 of the top 25 — throws ever.

As important as technique and mental approach can be, the shot put remains — at its core — physical and brutal.

“Throwing a 16-pound ball for a living beats you up,” Crouser said.

Doctors found two blood clots in his leg last summer. Cleared to fly at the last moment, he traveled to Budapest to defend his world championship.

Since then, a torn pectoral muscle and nagging elbow injury have forced him to adjust his practice routine. Sometimes he throws hard and takes a few days off, other times he strings together light workouts.

“I have had a bit of difficulty recognizing that I am getting older,” he says. “It makes me cherish this Olympic experience even more because I can see that I cannot do this forever.”

2024 Paris Summer Olympic Games

Heading into Saturday night’s final in Paris, it wasn’t clear if the elbow could hold up for six rounds. Rather than build his distances gradually, Crouser chased big throws early — a gamble — hoping his opponents might tighten up if they fell behind.

Throwing 74 feet 3 inches on his first attempt, he raised his arms and worked the crowd. His lead had widened by the third round, at which point nature intervened.

A storm blew in, drenching the stadium and making the shot put ring treacherously slippery. One after another, competitors started attempts only to have their feet slip and their throws fall harmlessly. U.S. teammate and longtime rival Joe Kovacs unleashed a gutty try in the final round but, for a third consecutive Olympics, finished with silver.

Speaking in the mixed zone, Crouser reflected on years of eating right, getting nine hours of sleep each night and forgoing alcohol except for a 10-day vacation at the end of each track season. He mused about winning a fourth gold at the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles.

If his body lasts. If he can keep thinking up improvements for his technique.

A reporter asked him about a moment from earlier in the evening. Before the finals, the shot putters emerged from a tunnel, one by one, pausing in front of a television camera. Crouser dropped to one knee in an homage to French sculpture.

His pose? The Thinker.

In a matter of days, the easygoing vibe of summer break will be replaced with the rigid schedules of a new school year.

The transition isn’t always easy, even for kids who are eager to return to the classroom. And if children are nervous about a new teacher, new school, or the prospect of making new friends, things can be even more fraught.

With summer break drawing to a close, The Times spoke with psychologists about how parents can help their children embrace a back-to-school mindset. Here’s their advice:

Don’t wait until the last minute to talk about the new school year.

Instead of having one big conversation, make the transition a little at a time in the final week or two of summer break, said Samantha Sweeney, a licensed psychologist in Washington, D.C. You might spend a few hours gathering school supplies; another day, you can plot out what to pack for lunches. Activities like these provide opportunities for kids to talk about how they’re feeling about the upcoming year.

“If you bring it up all at once, you get freaked out all at once,” she said. “Doing it gradually is usually easier for kids.”

If your child is anxious about going back to school, don’t try to talk them out of it.

It’s important to acknowledge their feelings and make them feel heard, experts say.

“If you say, ‘No no no, school is great and it’s going to be wonderful,’ they’ll say, ‘You don’t get it,’ or ‘You don’t understand,’” said Sweeney, co-author of “Working With Worry: A Workbook for Parents on How to Support Anxious Children.”

Trying to convince a kid to feel a certain way is likely to backfire, said Eileen Kennedy-Moore, a clinical psychologist in Princeton, N.J., who specializes in parenting and child development. “The harder we argue, ‘It’s going to be great!’ the harder they’ll insist, ‘It’s going to be terrible!’”

Don’t give false assurances.

It’s risky to tell your child that everything will be just fine, or that school will be the same as it was last year, because that might not turn out to be true, Sweeney said.

Instead, boost their confidence by reminding them of past successes, like their track record of making new friends. You can also tell them you’ll be there to support them if they need help.

Try to pinpoint the source of their concern.

Are they nervous because they don’t know what to expect from a new teacher? Will they be using a locker for the first time and they’re worried about forgetting the combination for their lock?

Once you have a better idea of what you’re dealing with, you and your child can work together to brainstorm a solution, experts said. Get the ideas flowing by reminding them of times they’ve overcome similar problems in the past.

“You’re guiding them but you’re not giving them all the answers,” said Mary Alvord, a cognitive behavioral psychologist in Rockville, Md., and co-author of “The Action Mindset Workbook for Teens.” “My goal with parents is to teach kids how to be more proactive, how to take initiative. It builds resilience.”

Consider a dress rehearsal of the first day of school.

This isn’t necessary for everyone, but if a child is worried about how they’ll get to campus or where to find a bathroom, a dry run may allay their concerns.

“Knowing what to do can help kids feel more confident that they can cope,” said Kennedy-Moore, creator of the Kids Ask Dr. Friendtastic podcast.

The school may even allow your child to meet their teacher while they’re setting up their classroom, said Sweeney, who has worked as a school psychologist.

“When they walk in the door on the first day and see a familiar face, that can make a big difference,” she said.

Talk through worrisome scenarios.

“It’s impossible to anticipate every possible problem, so an important question to have your child consider is, ‘Who could help you if you need help?’ Kennedy-Moore said.

You might be able to solve some problems in advance. For instance, if your child is concerned about having someone to sit with at lunch, encourage them to make a plan with a friend.

A conversation may also help your child realize that the things they’re afraid of are very unlikely to happen. If they’re scared that no one will pick them up and they’ll have to spend the night at school, ask if that’s ever happened to them, or to anyone they know personally.

Encourage kids to reconnect with their friends.

Kids may be nervous about seeing some of their classmates for the first time in months. Smooth the way by arranging a playdate or two before school starts. Older kids might prefer to break the ice by reaching out with a text or via a social media app, Sweeney said.

Another way to help settle a child’s nerves is having them practice what they’ll do when they see their peers at school. Kennedy-Moore suggests they look the friend in the eye, smile and say “Hi,” along with the friend’s name. Follow up with a sincere compliment — “Cool backpack!” — or a question that starts with “how” or “what.”

To further put a child at ease, rehearse how they’d respond to a likely question. If asked, “How was your summer?” a child can reply “Great,” followed by a fact like “We went to the beach with my cousins,” Kennedy-Moore said.

Give your kids time to adjust their sleep schedule.

Moving it gradually will make for an easier transition, experts say. Wake them up 15 or 30 minutes earlier each morning and encourage them to get dressed and eat breakfast to establish a routine. If the earlier start makes them tired, that will help them fall asleep earlier too.

Getting enough rest is an important factor in school success, said Alvord, adjunct professor at George Washington University’s School of Medicine and Health Sciences.

“A lack of sleep interferes with emotion regulation and with clarity of thought,” she said. “When you’re tired, everything seems much worse.”

But if the new sleep schedule doesn’t stick before school starts, don’t panic. Just keep their after-school schedules open to facilitate earlier bedtimes.

“Your kids will get over the jet lag from the schedule shift in a few days,” Kennedy-Moore said.

Don’t pass your own anxieties on to your kids.

Children often look to adults for cues about how to respond in unfamiliar or unusual situations, Kennedy-Moore said.

“If we, as parents, are calm and generally positive about school, it makes it easier for kids to have positive expectations,” she said.

That may be easier said than done. When it comes to their children, parents tend to worry about the worst-case scenario and see things in all-or-nothing terms, Alvord said. If they can learn to recognize and adjust their thinking patterns, they can help their children to do the same, she said.

Focus on the positive.

If the first day of school puts your child through the wringer, praise them for sticking it out.

“Say, I’m so proud of you, we’re getting ice cream,’” Sweeney said. “I have a personal philosophy that ice cream fixes everything.”

A Los Angeles County jury found businesses that make or distribute engineered stone at fault Wednesday for the suffering of a 34-year-old stonecutter afflicted with an incurable disease.

In a decision watched closely by silicosis experts and the stone industry, jurors deliberating at Stanley Mosk Courthouse in downtown L.A. decided largely in favor of Gustavo Reyes Gonzalez, who was diagnosed with silicosis and had to undergo a double lung transplant after years of cutting engineered stone countertops.

The decision followed deliberations that spanned five days of the multi-week trial. Before the verdict, the two sides in the case had agreed that economic losses for Reyes Gonzalez exceeded $8 million.

The jury decided that other damages — which could include physical pain, mental suffering and emotional distress — amounted to more than $44 million. However, because the jury did not deem the defendants wholly responsible for those damages, they will not be collectively liable for the full amount.

It concluded that Caesarstone USA bore 15% of the responsibility, Cambria 10% and Color Marble 2.5%. The court will ultimately determine how much each defendant must pay.

Reyes Gonzalez is among scores of California countertop cutters who have sued companies like Caesarstone and Cambria after falling ill with silicosis, which is caused by inhaling tiny particles of crystalline silica.

His case was the first to go to trial, according to his attorneys. It tested whether companies that manufacture or distribute slabs of artificial stone, commonly marketed as quartz, could be held responsible for the ravages of silicosis, an ancient disease now emerging among countertop cutters barely in middle age.

Scientists have linked the eruption of silicosis cases among stonecutters to the booming popularity of engineered stone, which is typically much higher in lung-scarring silica than natural stone such as granite or marble. In California, more than a dozen countertop cutters have died of silicosis in recent years. In a recent study of the emerging cases and fatalities, researchers found the median age at death was 46.

Attorneys for Reyes Gonzalez argued that the companies had failed to provide sufficient warning about the dangers of cutting the slabs and that the risks far outweighed the benefits of their products. Gilbert Purcell, one of his lawyers, told the jury that engineered stone has “nasty, nasty risks” that had not been properly disclosed.

“A company should never needlessly cause risk to others,” Purcell said, “and that’s what they did.”

For instance, Purcell argued, Cambria had failed for a decade and a half to warn that silica dust could be an invisible hazard. How can workers avoid breathing dust, he argued, “when you can’t even know you’re breathing it because it’s invisible?”

Lawyers representing companies that make or distribute engineered stone argued that the operators of the Orange County workshops where Reyes Gonzalez worked were to blame. If they had used the proper protections, he would not have gotten silicosis, said Peter Strotz, an attorney representing Caesarstone USA.

“They knew what they had to do. They didn’t do it. … Worst of all, they deceived Mr. Reyes Gonzalez. They led him to believe he would be protected when he was not,” Strotz told the jury. He argued Caesarstone USA had done its part by providing safety information and should not be blamed for the “misuse” of its products.

Cambria attorney Lindsay Weiss said the company had provided warnings, including labels on the slabs themselves, and offered free training to the “fabricators” who cut, grind and polish the material to shape it into countertops.

She held up a sample of its quartz surfacing material to the jury, telling them it was safe. “The problem is when people don’t follow the law when they handle this product,” Weiss said.

And Color Marble, a distributor, argued there was no proof that Reyes Gonzalez had cut or polished slabs sold by its company. The jury found Color Marble liable for negligence — as it did Caesarstone USA and Cambria — but did not deem it liable for other claims for product liability as it had for those firms.

The lawsuit initially targeted a long list of companies, but all but three — Caesarstone USA, Cambria and Color Marble — were dismissed or settled before the jury reached a verdict. Attorney James Nevin, who represents Reyes Gonzalez, said most had “resolved the case pursuant to confidential agreements.”

Strotz, representing Caesarstone USA, declined to comment on the verdict.

Weiss said her client, Cambria, disagreed with the decision. “We think this is not a product issue. It’s a workplace safety issue,” she said. “This is handled safely every single day.”

Raphael Metzger, one of the attorneys representing Reyes Gonzalez, called the decision “a win for public health and occupational safety.”

He grew emotional as he praised the jurors for their work. “Only in America,” he said, “can Hispanic immigrants come here and receive justice — as they have.”

The trial, which stretched more than a month, spotlighted the dangers facing workers like Reyes Gonzalez, who testified that he came to the U.S. from the Mexican state of Veracruz as a teenager to escape poverty. For years, he worked from morning to evening cutting slabs for countertops.

Dust was rampant in the Orange County workshops where he labored, Reyes Gonzalez testified, at times so much that it looked like fog. His mask would grow filthy. Even when he used water while cutting, he said, “a lot of dust would come off” when the liquid had dried.

His wife, Wendy Torres Hernandez, said that when Reyes Gonzalez got his diagnosis, he called her crying. “He was told that there was no cure for it. There was nothing that he could do,” she said.

“I told him we would figure something out to help him, because I couldn’t just let him die,” she testified. Despondent, he told her “that he was going to start planning for his funeral.”

Reyes Gonzalez ultimately became so sick that both his lungs needed to be replaced in a transplant. The surgery may afford him only six more years to live before he needs another set of transplanted lungs — and a doctor testified that if that did happen, he would be unlikely to get a third transplant because of his age.

He will have to take a host of medications and carefully monitor his health until he dies. Because of the medicines he takes, Reyes Gonzalez said he cannot have children, which pains him because his wife adores them. Doctors might find a way for them in the future, he said, but cannot guarantee it.

Lawyers for Caesarstone and other companies focused much of their questioning on members of the Silverio family, who paid Reyes Gonzalez for his work in a string of Orange County workshops. When a co-worker named Guillermo Mora de los Santos took the stand, a defense attorney questioned him about whether the Silverio shops had ever provided trainings on workplace safety or had any “silica control program.”

Mora de los Santos said no. “We didn’t know about that — about that disease,” he said about silicosis.

Weiss, representing Cambria, stressed to the jury that Reyes Gonzalez had described sweeping up dry dust and using compressed air to clean — practices that send dust into the air — and that he wasn’t provided with an adequate mask. Nor was water used properly, she said.

In court, one of the Silverios denied having seen safety information from Caesarstone that included a video on silicosis risks, despite having signed a form saying he had received such materials.

Purcell, in his closing remarks, argued that whatever the Silverios had done or not done could not absolve the defendants. “This chain of safety starts with them.”

In its verdict, the jury had the opportunity to assign a percentage of the total responsibility to “others” besides Reyes Gonzalez and the engineered stone companies. Jurors assigned 70% to “others” and 2.5% to Reyes Gonzalez himself.

The Silica Safety Coalition, an industry group that maintains that engineered stone can and should be cut safely, said the 70% fault attributed to “others” was an acknowledgment of the unsafe practices at his workplace.

“We think the California jury was wrong to blame the slab suppliers for any of Mr. Reyes-Gonzalez’s injuries from his unsafe workplace condition, and we anticipate the verdict will be appealed by one or more parties,” the coalition said in a statement.

Juror Laura Miller, who said she disagreed with most of her fellow jurors in finding the companies liable, said after the verdict that she felt the blame lay with the Silverios. To reach their decisions in the civil case, at least nine of 12 jurors had to agree on the verdicts.

“The employer was using no precautions,” Miller said.

Nevin, one of Reyes Gonzalez’s lawyers, said in a statement that the jury had “rightly rejected” efforts to blame “unsophisticated hirers” who had not been warned of the dangers themselves.

His firm, Brayton Purcell LLP, now represents more than 150 countertop cutters with silicosis who labored at more than 350 shops, it said in a statement. “The problem is the products, not the shops.”

Much of the court case revolved around the kinds of measures needed to protect workers from silica dust from engineered stone, as a string of experts testified about the risks of cutting such slabs. Among them was Dr. Kenneth Rosenman, who testified that Reyes Gonzalez got silicosis despite having used some tools that dispense water because they were “not sufficiently protective.”

“They do not lower the dust level low enough to prevent this severe disease,” said Rosenman, chief of the division of occupational and environmental medicine at Michigan State University.

Another witness for the plaintiff, industrial hygienist Stephen Petty, said that N95 masks would be “bottom of the barrel” protection for engineered stone dust. Even the most protective respirators, which use a tank of clean air, are not a “permanent solution” because workers tend to adjust them, breaking the seal, he said.

Defense attorneys turned to other witnesses, including industrial hygienist Brian Daly, who said that engineered stone can be cut and polished safely. Reyes Gonzalez “would not have developed silicosis had his employer had a program that was protective” and followed workplace safety regulations, Daly testified.

Judge William F. Fahey had excluded testimony that attorneys representing Reyes Gonzalez had sought from Georgia Tech scientist Jenny Houlroyd, saying her study was based on data that were not provided to the court, among other issues. Her analysis had concluded that it wasn’t economically feasible to employ the measures needed to safely cut engineered stone, especially for small workshops.

Artificial stone is “a uniquely toxic product,” and neither “wet methods” nor wearing a mask would make it safe to cut and grind, Houlroyd wrote in a prepared list of her opinions.