Chano Article - The Chicago Tribune
did a
sweet feature article this Sunday on Chano and how is an All-State level
athlete despite (or because of) the fact he has to run 5-10 miles every
single morning before going to school and practice. The paper version
had pictures of him running the route on the morning of Thursday's dual with
Hoffman side by side with a pic of him winning the meet. Cool stuff.
Results - Check our results of all
races at
PeoriaNotreDame.com.
Miles Updates - I updated
Week 6 miles and
the Mileage
Progression.
Picture Updates - People have flooded
me with a ton of good pictures lately. I added five new galleries:
Hinsdale #2,
Schaumburg #1 (varsity pics),
Schaumburg #2 (F/S pics),
Hoffman
Estates, and
Peoria
Notre Dame. My thanks go out to Steve Johnson for the Hinsdale and
Hoffman pics and to Erik Bethke for the Schaumburg pictures.
Peoria Notre Dame Invite - Boys Place Top
Three on All Levels
This meet's strength was reduced somewhat
with the absence of Naperville North, but there are still 60 teams in
attendance and scores of great runners from all classes of competition.
Doing well at this meet is a priority each year as we seek to build
confidence and team cohesion. We succeeded admirably in achieving that
goal on all levels.
Varsity Boys - Disputed Score Change
Results in a Narrow Loss
I am not quite sure what process was enacted
to get a place changed just as the team awards were being handed out, but we
thought we had defeated Sandburg by virtue of a better sixth runner.
We tied at 104 points, but were shifted one point down to 105 after I was
informed that Janusek from Lyons had been awarded 6th and Chano had been
shifted to 7th. The timing officials told me that the place had been
video reviewed because we go by a torso finish in Illinois. Chano beat
him on the chip time, but lost to him by an inch or two on the video (I saw
it). I can agree with that. My problem is whether they reviewed
the entire race for such finishes or whether that one was just chosen or
protested for. It would be highly unfair for it to be a review of just
one place - the rule must apply to all places in the race. To make
matters more confusing, no one actually has a copy of the corrected results
- Peoria Notre Dame posted the original score on their Web site as the
official result. So who actually knows whether we won or not? A
bit inconsistent if you ask me.
Anyway, the changed finish was a bit of a low
blow, but I certainly did not let it spoil the great race our guys ran
together. Sandburg also had a great effort to come from behind and
catch us, so win or lose there was not much separating us on Saturday.
Our goal was to correct the racing mistakes that we made two weeks ago at
Hinsdale. In that one, we ran as individuals and floundered throughout
the race, running far below our capabilities. We ran a superb team
effort in this one. At the 1 1/2 mile mark Chano was in 5th and all
the rest of our top 5 were in the top 19 with Bollman, Perez, Bethke, and
Laskowske running 16-17-18-19. We were up huge on LT and Sandburg at
that point, and our guys executed the two mile race plan perfectly.
They buried it to the two mile mark and then tried to hang on.
It almost worked. The LT and Sandburg
guys were chewing us up a bit as we faded, but I loved our courage and
teamwork. The end results were Chano in 7th (15:10), Bollman in 19th
(15:31), Lasko in 25th (15:36), Perez in 27th (15:38), Bethke in 32nd
(15:43), Larson in 54th (16:06), and Baran in 81st (16:21). The boys
faded hard, but ran with appropriate aggression, and I could not be prouder.
The course ran much slower than a year ago due to softer conditions and the
hot temperatures. Last year, 20 guys broke 15:00 and 87 were under
16:00. This year's figures were 3 and 50 for those two marks, and this
pattern repeated itself across all of the varsity boys and girls races.
Chano and Alec were off of their times from this meet last year, but the
rest of our guys ran nice PRs. Comparisons:
F/S Boys - Laskowske and Bethke Lead Team
to 3rd Overall
We never seem to completely put it together
in this race and come up with a winning effort, but we have had some trophy
winning races over the years. We finished third in this one by six
points, but I could not have been much happier with how we ran. Our
F/S set a great tone for the other two races because they executed the race
plan to perfection. On Tuesday we practiced having poise and running
the right kind of first mile, and the boys did that to perfection.
Erik and A.J. came through the 800 near 25th
place, and they moved up well by the mile to be right in the thick of
things. A.J. left Erik just after the 1 1/2 mile mark and forced his
way momentarily into the top ten before settling for a 12th place finish in
a new PR of 16:20. Erik had his best race of the year by far as he
controlled himself early and reaped the benefits late. He was 15th in
16:31 and battled well with a couple of conference rivals from Schaumburg.
Behind our front runners, there was a massive
pack of guys just feeding off of each other through most of the race.
At the 1 1/4 mile mark, McGough, Gregorio, Kuerschner, Frey, Meincke,
Johnson, and Cox were running like a fist and drawing a ton of power from
each other. McGough, Meincke, and Johnson eventually pushed themselves
off the front of that group and ended as our 3rd-5th men. Our three
through seven finishers came in within 20 seconds of one another. I
was just ecstatic about our team race, and loved that guys like Gates,
Alberti, and Tomkiewicz also had such strong races. A bunch of our
other freshmen got their first taste of a three mile race and will look to
improve a ton next time.
JV Boys - Kierys Spearheads Total
Domination
Nothing fills me with more pride in our
program than winning JV races. Most meet directors don't even hand out
trophies for these races, and that is symbolic of how most coaches see their
JV - as people who will never run fast and are not worth the time and
effort. Every year we seem to have a great JV and that is a testament
to the strength of our total team.
Luke Kierys and Colin Morlock are both on a
mission to crack the top seven, and they got out hard with the intent of
running fast. They stayed together until just past the mile when
Kierys broke away going into the back loop. He would power home to win
in a huge new PR of 15:59 (which would have placed him top 50 in the varsity
race). Morlock faded a bit, but rallied late to hold off all but one
of the Lyons pack that pounced on him mid-race. The great finishing
stories come from Olson, Blyth, and Smith. Those three battled with
five LT guys throughout the middle mile, but all three of them rallied late
to put their guys away and go after others. Olson ended up in second
with a huge PR of 16:18 while Blyth powered away from two guys in the last
mile to finish right behind Morlock in fifth. Justin Smith just
refused to give up and ended up in ninth as our fifth man. We scored
21 points overall.
Matt Wiggen and Ryan Wojdyla continued their
great seasons by finishing 15th and 16th, respectively, with Ryan finishing
in the hard luck spot just one out of the medals. Both guys broke
17:00. Other PRs in the race were run by Eric Rodriguez, Mike Abram,
John Pasowicz, Alvaro Colin, and a host of others. Way to go guys!
I am very proud of you individually and as a group. Comparisons:
Hoffman Estates Dual - Boys and Girls Win
on All Levels
Varsity Boys - Chano and Alec Lead a 19-41
Victory
Hoffman Estates always has a couple of really
good guys, and I know they train really hard in the summer so I always
expect a tough team race as well. A lot of their best guys from last
year graduated so I did not know exactly what to expect. We knew and
respected Perez and Gonzalez and ended up getting a great battle from their
third man Hamilton, but our depth allowed us to win in the end.
Chano and Alec ran a nice team game again as
Chano took the pace out hard and burned Perez out a bit in the back loop.
Alec then picked him up just past the two mile and those two cruised in side
by side for a 1-2 finish. Perez held on for third. Tommy
Laskowske and Juan Perez were able to break Gonzalez and cruise in together
the last 400 meters, but Bethke fell off the pace and ended up as our 5th
man. Baran held his spot as 6th man while Larson held off a
hard-charging Kierys to stay 7th.
It was a nice win overall, and I give a lot
of credit to Hoffman for pushing hard and turning it into a tougher race
than we would have liked. It is tough to get up for an MSL dual when a
big invite like Peoria is on the horizon, but our guys worked hard enough
and earned a tough victory.
F/S Boys - The Pirate Swarm Finishes 1-10
I'm not sure if I have ever had as much fun
watching one of our F/S races. Our emphasis was on grouping up and
working together while showing poise early in the race. A.J. and Erik
pulled back to run with our second pack, and it quickly became clear that
the Hoffman boys had gone out too hard. Our guys hooked up in spots
1-7 at the the mile and proceeded to push hard as a group for the rest of
the race. We ended up having eight guys finish in the same second with
the "victory" going to Tim Meincke. Tomkieiwcz and Gates completed the
1-10 sweep with solid runs. We also ran four solid F/S guys in a
workout before the race so the group could have been even bigger (no Frey,
Roehrborn, Garcia, Baumgartner). Time comparisons versus our first
meet:
September 14, 2008 - Boys and Girls Win
at Schaumburg
The boys and girls each had great
performances on both levels in our Thursday dual with Schaumburg at Hoover
Elementary School. The ladies put seven in the top nine as Sarah McIntosh
ran to a dominating victory. They also went 1-5 in the open race. Our F/S
followed suit by sweeping the top six spots and eight of the top ten,
winning 15-48. The varsity race was even better. Schaumburg’s Pat
Lesiewicz won the race in a course record time of 15:42, but we took the
next ten spots to win handily by a score of 20-43. Lesiewicz’s run was so
impressive and a privilege to watch. Twenty years of great Schaumburg guys
have run there, but he broke the record by seven seconds and looks as if he
is moving into state title contention individually.
September 7, 2008 - Boys Take Three
Trophies at Hinsdale
The boys and girls teams opened their invite
season on Saturday at the Hinsdale Hornet-Red Devil Invite. Both teams
competed well even though we did not win any of the five levels in which we
competed. The boys placed third in the sophomore race, second in the
varsity race, and second in the freshman race. Neuqua Valley won all
three levels and looked great. The girls placed second in both the
varsity and the open races behind Hinsdale Central. I put links to
official results of all races on our Results
page.
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.
Baby Christopher's First Pictures - For Friends and Family
Since Madeline got her own photo gallery on PalatineCC, I
thought I would make sure to put
Christopher Dunbar
Quick's first pics out here as well. He was born on August 4, 2008
at a weight of 9 lbs 9 oz and was 22 inches long. At that weight he
will be bigger than me soon. Meri is okay now, but it was a tough
birth since he was a week overdue.
We debated about names for a long time (years in fact) and
we finally decided to use two family names: Christopher is my first name
obviously and Dunbar is Meredith's maiden name. Rejected choices
included John Kenneth Quick (sorry Lancaster), Augustus, Robert Dylan, and
thousands of others. Enjoy!
