Miles Updates - I updated the
Miles for Week 4
and the season
Mileage Progression.
Picture Updates - I added a
gallery
of pictures from the Prospect Dual courtesy of Marcin Zuberek and the
Cox family. Thanks everyone! I will also have pics from Saturday
as soon as Zuberek gets me a disc.
Varsity Race - Bernardo and Bollman Finish
in the Top Seven
We faced a tall task in going up against
Neuqua Valley in this one. They won the state and national meets last
season and returned Danny Pawola and Aaron Beattie, both of whom finished
All-State last season. Our goal was to make a strong challenge to the
two mile mark and then try to hang on. Things did not really turn out
that way...
Chano hooked up early with Beattie (4:52)
while Bollman hung back off of Neuqua's #3 man with Bethke (5:01). As
we hit the mile, another pack of guys including Jeff Larson, Colin Morlock,
Luke Kierys, Tom Laskowske, Matt Baran, and Vlad Novikov formed off of
Neuqua's #5-#7 guys (around 5:10). Our plan was to charge hard to the
two mile mark, but everything splintered apart much too early. Bethke
lost Bollman as Alec moved well in the second mile and ended up in no man's
land when Larson was not able to get in. The result: we perished out
there as individuals rather than flourishing as a team. I may have
expected a bit much from 5-6 guys who were running in their first varsity
invite. Certainly, we need to work on keeping our poise and working
together when things do not go as expected in a race.
In the end we simply got blown out by a
better team on the day. Chano and Alec placed 5th and 7th and then we
landed a huge pack in the 20s and 30s as Laskowske, Bethke, all came in
within 10 seconds of one another. Morlock and Kierys also ran better
than Tuesday to finish as #6 and #7 for us. Our times can improve a
great deal, but most of the coaches were in agreement that Legge ran much
slower than it did a year ago. Coach Vandersteen thought times were
10-15 seconds slow based on some of his kids' efforts.
I certainly think we can give Neuqua a much
better run than we did. Juan Perez sat out for precautionary reasons,
and Chano ran while sick after missing school on Thursday and Friday.
I also sensed that Thursday's really hard tempo did in quite a few of the
top seven. Still, those are all just excuses, and we will need to work
better as a unit to challenge any of the top five teams in the state.
Most programs would be happy with getting second at an invite like this, but
your goals for this season are much higher. I was more upset about how
we raced than with the end result. We'll fix things up and get back to
business versus Schaumburg this week on Thursday. Heads up, boys.
Next race.
Moving on to the positives, nearly every man
on the team ran faster than he did last year in this race. Bogs and
Pass ran more than 6:00 faster than a year ago! Those boys have been
working their tails off, and it was great to see them rewarded. Other
mega-improvers included Eddie Kovach, Ryan Wojdyla, and Alvaro Colin.
Improvement tables will come later this week - I left my clipboard at
school.
Sophomore Race - Kuerschner's Huge Run
Keys Solid Team Race
Our sophomores faced a taller task when Lucas
Roehrborn came up a bit gimpy on Thursday with a strained hip flexor.
Lucas ran as our #3 in the first meet, but sat out on Saturday. We
knew Neuqua would offer a tough challenge so they key was for some others to
step up.
We ended up finishing third as a team behind
Neuqua and New Trier, but I was pretty pleased with the efforts our guys
gave. A.J. Laskowske had another strong race to place 5th overall in a
lifetime PR of 16:43 for three miles. Erik Bethke faded after going
out too quick, but Erich Kuerschner picked ran the race of his life to pick
us up. I could not believe how hard Kuersch charged in the middle of
the race. He ran 17:21 and nearly caught Erik! I was so proud of
his effort.
The other big story was that Ryan McGough,
our transfer from Jacobs, ran really well in his debut as a Pirate.
Ryan was our 4th man in 17:38 and showed that he will be a huge factor this
season (especially after he showed his strength in Thursday's tempo run).
Kendall Cox and Reuben Frey were our #5 and #6 sophs at just over 18:00
while Berti and Gates finished just over 19:00. Kyle Norris beat a
bunch of people in his first three mile race, and I was proud of his
aggressiveness.
Freshmen Race - Tomkiewicz and Yosif Help
Seal Runner-Up Finish
Above: Tim Meincke, Anthony Gregorio, and
Tim Johnson finish as a three-headed monster versus Prospect.
Every year our junior high coaches seem to
think that they have little talent to send our way, and every year we work
with kids over the summer and come in to Hinsdale and win a trophy.
None of our top three guys broke 5:30 for the 1600 in junior high, yet all
three approached that pace for two miles on grass after a consistent summer
of work. Meincke, Gregorio, and Johnson finished within two seconds of
one another in places 10, 11, and 12 (11:12-11:14).
The trick to doing well at this meet though
is depth, and we got a nice spark from Peter Tomkiewicz, who made a huge
impact by running 11:47 and finishing as our #4. Noah Yosif also
stepped it up to be our #5 scorer and run 12:05, which is really solid
considering he has only been training for two weeks. Other nice
efforts included an aggressive and gutsy run by Ryan Erdmann as well as
solid first efforts from Zach Scheve, Ryan Blihovde, and Jack Bobus.
Overall, we placed 2nd behind Neuqua Valley,
who had 40-50 freshmen compared to our ten. We seem to do well despite
our lack of numbers, but we will really have to improve a lot to be on par
with a program like Neuqua in the future. Way to go freshmen!
September 3, 2008 - Pirate Boys and
Girls Win Openers
We finally got to kick off our season last
night in a dual meet with Prospect. The heat was brutal with the
temperature in the low 90s at race time with the heat index in the mid-90s.
Despite the heat, the boys ran impressively, winning 19-41 on the varsity
level and 20-39 on the F/S level. Prospect is a talented and tough
team who will be much better down the road when we meet again. A
couple of their key guys were out last night so I am sure they will be ready
when the big meets come around at the end of the season. Our girls
also ran well. I don't know the final varsity score, but we went
1-3-4-5-6 for 19 points.
A nice picture gallery is on the way...as
soon as Marcin gets me the CD of all the pictures he took last night.
Varsity Race - Bernardo, Bethke, and
Bollman Sweep Top 3 Spots
Prospect is known for their great half-milers
so we wanted to make this race a fast one from the gun. Chris Hayek
and Albert Ciolek in particular have a ton of speed so our guys wanted to
get out hard and try not to let the meet come down to kicks. By the
800 mark, Chano and Hayek were clearly separated from the rest of the field,
hitting that mark in 2:18-2:20 and then scorching through the mile in 4:51.
The rest of our pack of five guys were right at 5:01 and looking good.
Just past the mile and a half mark, Chano
surged hard and put Hayek into difficulty. This allowed Bollman and
Adam Bethke to benefit as they ran a bit more conservatively and were able
to pass him coming in. Hayek probably gets second with a more
conservative race, but I really enjoyed watching him go out and battle.
It was pretty sweet to see this tall, muscular 800 meter stud going up
against small and powerful little Chano. I am sure those two will meet
again and the race will be much closer.
In the end our guys ran some great opening
times considering the miserable conditions. Chano ran 14:57 to take
another spot on
our
all-time Deer Grove Top 50 list while Alec and Adam finished in 15:23
and 15:24. Adam had a great last 300 meters to catch Hayek, and he set
a 20 second PR. That incredible summer of work is starting to pay off!
Behind those three, Juan Perez (15:42) and Jeff Larson (15:58) ran solid,
but the real surprise of the night (even to himself) was Tom Laskowske.
Only five weeks removed from hernia surgery, he came out and ran 15:48,
lowering his PR by 25 seconds or so. Justin Olson also ran a great
race to finish as seventh man in a new PR of 16:08.
Behind the top seven we had some real solid
performances if not a ton of PRs. Matt Wiggen dropped his all-time
best from 17:45 to 16:35 to show that his transition from sprinter to
distance runner is nearing completion. The short shorts will be the
final step! Brian Sund, Justin Smith, and Ryan Wojdyla packed it up
well and both Vlad Novikov (16:18) and Matt Baran (16:28) gave real solid
efforts. John Pasowicz (19:12) also ran real close to his all-time
best.
I updated the list of
Palatine career
bests for Deer Grove East as well. This list catalogs the career
best for every Palatine athlete who has run the varsity course at Deer Grove
East. There weren't a ton of PRs, but that had more to do with the
weather.
F/S Race - Laskowske, Bethke, and
Roehrborn Go 1-2-3
I had no clue what to expect in this race.
I had the feeling that our sophs were in great shape, but they have not been
able to keep up with the varsity in practice. Prospect also has three
great sophs - Netols, Strobel, and Ashton - and I wasn't sure if they would
run varsity or not. Netols and Ashton ended up running varsity with
Strobel not competing, but it would have been fun to see how things turned
out with both F/S squads racing one another.
In the end A.J. Laskowske opened his season
with the best race of his career thus far, dominating from the gun.
A.J. took control just past the 800 meter mark, turned in a mile split of
5:12, and just kept going from there. His 13:12 time was #9 on our F/S
Deer Grove list, but his effort on this hot day had to be worth closer to
13:00. Basically, anyone who has run 13:12 or faster has been a very
good varsity CC runner at Palatine, including a couple of All-Staters.
Way to go A.J.!
Behind A.J., Erik Bethke (13:37) and Lucas
Roehrborn (13:38) battled with a couple of Prospect guys throughout the
race, but were able to pull away at the end to complete a 1-2-3 sweep.
The times from our top three guys all made the
Top 50 Palatine
F/S times at Deer Grove East. Kendall Cox ran as our #4 man in his
first high school CC race, finishing with a game 13:52, and close on his
heels were a triumvirate of freshmen. Tim Meincke (14:11), Anthony
Gregorio (14:12), and Tim Johnson (14:13) all had stunning debuts to finish
as our 5-6-7 men in their first high school CC race. To top it all
off, Reuben Frey continued his return from last year's broken leg to run
14:25. I am so proud of how Reuben persevered through a terrible
injury to get back in shape and start contributing to the team on the course
again.
Erich Kuerschner (14:49) also ran near his PR
from last season, and he was shadowed by Zach Gates (15:42) and Jake Alberti
(15:47) as our sophs continued to show massive improvement. Jake had a
great kick to hold off a hard charge from a Prospect runner, and I could not
have been prouder of the competitive spirit he showed in the last 300
meters. The rest of our freshmen got an introduction to high school
running and survived the heat. Great job everyone!
