Practice Schedule - Week 8
 

Sun 9-27	Mon 9-28	Tues 9-29	Wed 9-30	Thurs 10-1	Fri 10-2	Sat 10-3
On own	6:00 am (JV-Var) 3:35 pm (Fr-So) York Invite 3:45 pm (JV -Var)	3:45 pm (all)	6:00 am (So-JV-Var) 3:45 pm (all)	3:35 pm (bus) Schaumburg, Barrington Triangular	6:00 am (all)	8:00 am (all)

Picture Updates - I put together a gallery of pics taken by Steve Schalla.  I also have a ton of pictures from Donny Mac, but they crash my computer every time I try to transfer them to my hard drive.  I'll keep working on those.  The files are a bit too big.

History Updates - I updated all four of the lists I keep for performances at Deer Grove.  Excepting the top seven who will run in the IHSA Regional we host, the rest of the team will not run on our course for the remainder of the season.  Check out where your best time now stands on the Palatine career list or see if you were able to crack the Top 50 Palatine performances at Deer Grove East.  Three of our freshmen made it on to Top 50 performances on our F/S course.  Lastly, I updated the Top 50 All-Time Best list, which factors in all performances at Deer Grove East since 2001.  Nico Composto's 14:12 winning time placed as the 8th best performance, but he is the 5th best individual performer.  It now takes 14:32 to be one of the top 50 performers on our course.

Palatine Invite - Boys Excel on All Four Levels

Boys Varsity - 23 Second Split Nabs 3rd Place Finish

We knew that this varsity race was going to be a tall order, but we approached the opportunity to run the two best teams in the state with a lot of enthusiasm.  Deer Grove East is our house and the Palatine Invite is our show so we wanted to have our best effort.  We certainly ran well and have a lot of room to keep improving.  Our top five ran fast (14:42, 14:42, 14:45, 15:01, 15:05), and we finished with a sweet 23 second split. 

Obviously, short splits can be deceiving and often indicate that a team's front runners may not be getting it done.  Chano and Alec certainly ran better than last week, but they need to keep working to jump in with the top 10-15 caliber guys that we see each week.  They placed 8th and 9th in the same time to give us a solid 1-2 punch, but the times they ran indicate that they will be at the margins of All-State.  I know they will keep coming on as the season progresses so this was a solid step forward. 

A.J. Laskowske returned to top form after being sick the week before, and his emergence has certainly made us really strong in a big meet.  Now, the trick is to get A.J. and Jeff to run great on the same day so we can have a chance at beating the very best teams.  At Peoria Notre Dame, Jeff ran outstanding to finish in 15:15 while A.J. was just solid in 15:22.  At Palatine A.J. had the great race (14:45) while Jeff just ran solid (15:01).  Imagine what the team can look like if they both run 14:45-14:50 on the same day!  We can make that happen on the right day.

The other trick we need to pull is getting our #5 runner right on top of Larson when he has his best day.  Gregorio (15:05) and Wojdyla (15:10) are both on extreme upswings as they continue their breakout years.  I love nothing more than a top notch sophomore during the championship part of the season, and I know that Anthony can get up with A.J. and Jeff.  Does anybody reading this who knows Ryan "Wo-Ho" Wojdyla believe what is happening?  Dilla has the magic this season, and he continues to astound.  Every year our program produces one of these guys, and my pride in his emergence knows no bounds.  What a testament to hard work and belief in oneself.

The other fun thing about this season is seeing our guys compete to get into the top 7.  Reuben held that spot with a 15:29, but Smith (15:43), Bethke (15:43), McGough (15:45), Johnson (15:47), and Meincke (15:51) are hot on his tail.  Any one of those guys could taper big and get way up in the mix.  It is a luxury to have so much depth at our disposal.  This will also serve us well as we try to win all three levels of the MSL for the second year in a row.

Boys Junior Varsity - JV Wins Best Invisible Trophy Yet

We have been on a quest to win the Junior Varsity race at the Palatine Invite since 2003.  Every year we seem to have a great JV team only to get wiped out by York in this race.  I knew that we could do it one of these years, and I am so proud that these were the boys to get it done.  It says something about the focus of our program when I am most excited about winning the JV race at an invite.  As coaches we all make it a point to coach every athlete on the team, and nothing ratifies this approach more than the hard work, belief, and tough racing of our guys outside the top seven. 

This squad was elevated by the return of senior captain Justin Smith, and he led our charge with a lifetime best of 15:43.  York's top two guys managed to get 2nd and 3rd in 15:37 and 15:38, but our boys packed it up after Smith to give us the necessary edge.  Erik Bethke continued to drop time down to 15:44 while Ryan McGough showed that he is rounding into form at the right time of year by running a huge PR of 15:45.  All three of these guys were on our state team last year and look to be making bids for the top seven.

There were many great races on Saturday (see Joe Mars - freshmen race), but the two best efforts might have come from Brian Sund and Tirth Patel.  Both of these guys have killed themselves all summer to get in their best shape, often putting in more than 70-80 mile weeks.  It is always an amazing sight to see a young man's work become available in a race, and the finishes of these two were a great example.  Sund was with York's #3 and he put the pedal down at 400 meters to go and left him.  The race then came down to Tirth doing the same thing.  He passed York's #4 and another runner from LT to seal the deal.  Sund was bent over vomiting after the race, but I am sure that empty stomach filled with pride in his hard run for his team soon after.  We won 33-38.

Drew Shaler (16:07) put a good kick in to nearly catch York's #5 while Zach Gates (16:08), Erich Kuerschner (16:17), and Kendall Cox (16:31) all ran course PRs.  Another huge effort came from my man Jake Bogdanowicz who has been our de facto manager for much of the season as we tried to avoid a metatarsal stress fracture.  He decided to spike up and run at his senior Palatine Invite and ran to a monster PR of 18:42.  McCall (18:11), Alberti (17:32), and Pasowicz (17:51) also set new bests on the home course.  Congrats to all of the JV!  I could not be more proud of your efforts in this race.

Boys Sophomore - Super Top Four Pave the Way for a 3rd Place Finish

We faced a bit of a challenge in this race as we moved Anthony Gregorio up to the varsity level, which left us one man short of a possible winner.  The drop-off from our top five sophs to our number six man is quite big.  In the end we placed 3rd as a team, and the challenge of replacing Gregorio proved to be the best thing about the race.  I charged the rest of the sophomores with going out aggressively and getting high up in the race.  I knew that one of them would hang on and be our #5.  Ryan Erdmann ended up being our guy, and I was very proud of him.  He placed 96th overall in a great time of 17:50.  His time absolutely demolished his personal best.  I'm not sure Ryan has ever broken 20:00 before, and his 17:50 equates to about a 18:20 on a true three mile course.

Of course, Ryan's effort would not have mattered so much if our top four didn't get it done.  I really challenged Tim Johnson and Tim Meincke to show some fire after rather complacent runs last week at Peoria Notre Dame, and they responded with much better aggressiveness.  They were both leading at the 1 1/2 mile mark and were still in the lead group at 2 miles.  In the end Johnson kicked past his fellow Tim to finish 6th in a nice time of 15:48.  Meincke (15:51) finished right after him in 7th place.

This squad was also strengthened a great deal by the presence of Marcus Garcia.  Marcus is one of our toughest competitors, and that mentality often causes him to push himself to the point of injury in training.  He returned to serve as our 4th man and finish 20th.  Peter Tomkiewiecz also continued his strong return from early season injury to place 17th.  Barrington ended up winning the team title with 81 points as they put together their full frosh-soph squad to take the win.  St. Charles North was second with 96 points while we finished 3rd with 139.  Still, we led both of those schools through four guys (50-53-67), and Gregorio was the top sophomore in the varsity race.  This bodes well for our future, but this race also showed that Barrington will be a load to handle in the MSL West over the next couple of years.  They had a couple of freshmen show very well, and it will be interesting to see how our combined F/S squad matches up with them in the MSL Conference meet.

Boys Freshmen - Youngsters Excel in First Palatine Invite Test

I noticed last week at Peoria Notre Dame that York's F/S top seven had only one name I could find in any results from last year.  This meant two things: that their sophomores were a bit down and that their freshmen team was probably stellar.  I was right.  Our freshmen placed five guys in the top 27 and seven in the top 40 to score 80 points, but York just demolished the field.  The young Dukes placed fifteen men in the top 40 and ten guys in the top 25 to win easily with 28 points.   We obviously will have a tall order in the future.  Alex Mimlitz from York (12:46) and Nicholas Korhumel (12:49) both ran under the old freshmen meet record of 12:54, which was set by York's David Montgomery in 2002.  Lake Zurich finished third with 138 points.

The story of this race certainly had to be the gutty performance of Joey Mars.  Joe has been slowly discovering his talent over the course of the season, and I challenged everyone outside of our normal top four guys to get out aggressively and try to hang on.  Joe finally went after a race from the gun, and he absolutely floored me through the early and middle parts of his race with his conviction and belief.  He ended up finishing as our #4 man and breaking 14:00 for the first time.  I know that I am always inspired to see one of our guys figure it out on the course, and this was a real special moment for me.  Hopefully Joe can continue to show his immense talent as our season runs toward the conference meet.

Our usual front-runners on the freshmen team certainly held up their end of the bargain as all four of them ran their fastest times yet at Palatine.  Brian Smith again led the way with a 7th place finish and new course PR of 13:34.  Christian Zambrano (13:41), Adam Vanderwiel (13:44), and Jordan Jarrett (13:58) combined with Mars to give us a solid team score.  Behind our front pack of five, we had a ton of great races.  Zach Stella pushed through some lingering heel pain to finish in 14:11 while Mundeep Bawa (14:17), Harmeet Bawa (14:27), and Andrew Clingerman (14:27) packed it up for much of the race and looked really good.  Harmeet especially ran well, producing his best effort of the year by far.  Tyler Squeo ran okay to finish in 14:50, but he will need to have whatever Joe Mars had for breakfast the next time.  When freshmen learn to get aggressive, the good times and placed usually follow. 

Conant Dual - Palatine wins 18-38

Varsity Race - Strong Team Race Sends Boys Past Conant

There isn't much to report on this one as we were able to get past Conant without running three of our top five guys.  I challenged the JV and back end of our top seven to go out and get us a win, and they certainly got it done.  The lead pack of Jeff Larson, A.J. Laskowske, Reuben Frey, and Ryan Wojdyla finished 1-2-3-4 as all four ran course PR's ranging from 15:28-15:30.  Erik Bethke broke 16:00 for the fifth time to serve as our 5th man.  Conant was able to put four guys in front of him though and served notice that they will have some tough men to contend with in the near future.

Freshmen-Sophomore Race - The Pirate Pack Attacks!

Anthony Gregorio sat out this one entirely to get ready for the Palatine Invite, and our goal was to try and group up as many guys as possible at the front of the race.  Tim Johnson, Tim Meincke, Marcus Garcia, and Peter Tomkiewicz herded three freshmen into the group and they stuck together for most of the race.  Brian Smith and Christian Zambrano stayed right with the group so we let them dual it out at the finish for the win.  Brian stepped in front of Little Z at the end a both set new course PR's of 13:45 and 13:46.  Adam Vanderwiel also stuck near the back end of this group of six to give us a clean 15-50 sweep on the F/S level.

September 20, 2009 - Pirates Place 2nd at Peoria Notre Dame

We had a very stressful racing week with a monster dual meet against Fremd on Thursday night and the Peoria Notre Dame Invite on Saturday.  We did well on both accounts.  We defeated Fremd by a score of 21-38 to preserve both our MSL dual meet win streak and our school's win streak against Fremd.  It was a classic MSL dual if I have ever seen one and a lot of fun to be a part of. 

We had quite the adventure getting down to Peoria on Friday (see story below), and I wonder what impact that and our Thursday meet had on our PND performances.  We placed second to Loyola (who dominated the race), scoring 133 points to their 76.  Our guys ran solid times, but looked a bit flat, especially in the last mile.  We clearly need to run better as we face the best teams in the state, and our first two invites have proven that we are not yet in the top three teams.  Until we put together a more complete team effort, we will be hard pressed to break into the top triumvirate of York, Loyola, and Neuqua Valley. 

It's a long season though, and I would bet that we have better races in our near future.  Check out our Results section for full results of PND.  I also created a Program Strength chart to show how this year's team did relative to our teams since 2000 at this invite.  We look good in terms of depth and top end.  Again, if our top two guys start to run more in line with past Palatine front runners, we will start to look very good.

The Palatine Invite is this coming Saturday, and we will get to face York for the first time and get a rematch against Loyola.  It will once again be a blockbuster meet on both the girls and guys sides.  If you would like to volunteer in any capacity, please contact me via e-mail at cquick@d211.org.

Practice Schedule - Week 7
 

Sun 9-20	Mon 9-21	Tues 9-22	Wed 9-23	Thurs 9-24	Fri 9-25	Sat 9-26
On own	3:45 pm (all)	3:45 pm (all)	6:00 am (JV-Var) 12:50 pm (all)	3:35 pm (bus) Conant Dual	6:00 am (all)	7:15 am (bus) Palatine Invite

Mileage Updates - I put up the Miles for Week 5 and updated the Mileage Progression.

History Updates - Both Alec's and Chano's times made our list of the top 50 times ever run on the Detweiler course.  I also updated our Invitational Records page.

Picture Updates - I put up two galleries from this week, one from the Fremd Dual and the other from the Peoria Notre Dame Invite.  Enjoy.

Peoria Notre Dame - Boys Place 2nd in Varsity, 6th in Frosh-Soph, Win JV

Wondering why my report about our Peoria meet starts with a picture of a van?  It's because we had to push this dead beast to its final resting stop of despair just off of Exit 75 on I-80 in Peru, Illinois.  We couldn't leave school until after 7th period so our departure was delayed until 2:45.  We were making good time (despite an odd clicking noise I kept hearing every now and then).  As I went to pass a car hanging out in the left lane, my accelerator surged like the van was on cruise control.  Except it wasn't.  About 30 seconds later, the power steering died at about 70 mph.  Needless to say, I got everyone in their seat belts, white-knuckled the wheel, and pulled onto the shoulder of I-80 as semis and cars zoomed by.  We shambled along at about 20 mph trying to make it to an exit.  We had power, but the accelerator no longer worked and steering ability was minimal.  We somehow made it over a hill and rolled in neutral down to the Exit 75 ramp.

Have you ever been having a good time and then something happens and you look around and wonder, who is responsible here?  Then, you realize that it is you.  Well, I had that moment in spades.  We called the District 211 garage, and they determined that a new van had to be sent out to us (through rush hour traffic) along with a tow truck.  We popped the hood and decided we'd all give it a look.  Jeff, A.J., and Anthony are all in autos, but the best we could manage after looking at it was Alec's decision that "it must be the dipstick."  We closed the hood and evaluated our options: 1) we could ditch the van and go to the Hillside Weekend Flea Market, which was flourishing just across the fence in an old abandoned gas station parking lot 2) we could sit in the van and wait to get hit by an exiting semi or 3) we could push the sucker to a gas station and hope that putting gas in it caused a miracle.

We decided to do #3.  Imagine a bunch of cross country weenies pushing or lifting something large.  Then, imagine an even bigger group of weenies doing it.  That was us.  Have you ever noticed that exit ramps always go uphill?  We put Jeff behind the wheel as driver and started to push.  Being the strong men that we are, we got about 2/3 of the way up the ramp (no thanks to Bollman) and took a little break.  I mean, they give football players breaks every quarter, right?  We made some "man talk" on the side of the road and then got back after it.  At the apex of the ramp, the van started to roll, and we ran after it as it coasted toward the BP station, cheering and sprinting as we followed it to its final resting place.

Except it wasn't that either.  Most D211 vans run on diesel so we were a bit screwed since the BP was unleaded only.  We had to push it through a busy intersection across the street to a Shell station.  Even with some gas, it wouldn't start so we were officially stranded.  We did our run, ate at Quiznos, did some strides in a semi-parking lot as patrons at a local bar looked on, and waited for our saviors to arrive.  At 7:00 pm they called to tell us that they wouldn't be there until 8:00 pm.  Suffice it to say, we arrived at Detweiler park at 8:55 pm, well after sundown.  The long odyssey finally ended around 9:15 when we finally checked in.  Not an experience we want to repeat, but if you ever need some travel tips about Exit 75 in Peru, Illinois give one of us a call.

Varsity Race - Top Five Run 23 Second Split, Place Second

We knew that Loyola Academy would provide us with a stern test on Saturday, and after the race I am not sure we could have done much more to beat them on this day.  We certainly did not run our best race, but they delivered the best performance in the history of this Invite in my mind: 14:35, 14:42, 14:45, 15:05, 15:37 is incredibly good for September 19.  The final margin was 79-133.  We outdistanced third place Oak Park-River Forest (158) by 25 points, but that is also deceiving because they had a young man win the F/S race in 15:31.  Had he been in the varsity race, we would have ended up in a tie.

We had more bright spots than not, but three of our top four can run significantly better.  Both Alec and Chano need to do more for us up top (especially Chano), and I think A.J. was still a bit off after being sick for much of the preceding week.  Jeff Larson's race was the brightest spot - he ran 15:15 to record a massive PR and show that he is ready to step up and take his running toward an All-State level.  He will keep coming as we head toward the taper.  Sophomore Anthony Gregorio recorded a 15:27 in his first varsity invite ever and ended up as our fifth man.  Ryan Wojdyla (15:44) and Reuben Frey (15:56) ran solid races as our 6th and 7th to give us all seven guys under 16:00. 

I think our finish was absolutely impacted by the way I had us run the race and by the events preceding the race.  We just looked flat in the second half of the race and part of that comes from how hard we attacked in the opening and middle.  Our guys probably were out over their heads, but I like it that way in September.  Chano and Alec (2:15), Jeff (2:17), A.J. and Anthony (2:19), and Wo-Ho and Reuben (2:23) all overcooked the first 800 a bit, but those are the splits they'll need to be able to run in the state meet so that doesn't bother me. 

All of our guys were under 5:00 at the mile with our lead three being through in 4:47-4:49.  We came by the 1 1/2 mark with our top five all under 15:00 pace, but we still weren't winning the race as a team.  Loyola had their #4 right on Larson while Chano and Alec failed to make the jump to get into the lead group of 9 guys.  Had they moved to get with Loyola's #3 their races may have turned out differently.  Certainly, they will need to be more assertive and get in the right competitive groups from now on.  It was a bit disappointing to see two veteran CC guys miss a break like that.  We had Loyola's #5 by a lot in the back loop, but he closed up on our guys by the finish.  Anthony only got him by 10 seconds and that wasn't enough to make up for losses at all four of the other scoring positions.

On a positive note, all of our 3-7 guys set PRs in the two mile: Larson 9:57, A.J. 10:05, Anthony 10:09, Wojdyla 10:19, and Frey 10:24. Our guys clearly didn't have the legs to finish off of our torrid opening pace (five man split of 7:15-7:26 at 1 1/2 miles), but we usually run this way at this invite and find our finish by the end of the year.  Let's keep working hard to improve our team race and ability to finish and let Loyola worry about all of the pressure they'll now face to go out and beat York.  They certainly have the guys to do it.  Check out our improvements from last year:
 

Name	2008 PND	2009 PND	Improvement
Bollman	15:31	15:04	-27
Bernardo	15:10	15:08	-2
Larson	16:06	15:15	-51
Laskowske	16:10	15:22	-48
Gregorio	17:01	15:27	-94
Wojdyla	16:55	15:44	-71
Frey	17:13	15:56	-77

Freshmen-Sophomore Race - Freshmen Fare Well in First Three Mile Race

We pulled Anthony from this group to run on the varsity, and I was still hopeful for a trophy finish from the guys that we did run.  We didn't quite make it, but several inspiring races from our young guys kept us in close contention.  The race of the day in this one has to go to Peter Tomkiewicz.  Out much of the summer and early season nursing injuries related to growing so fast, Peter delivered the kind of race I have come to expect from him: tough as nails.  He ran 16:40 to really save us in the scoring.  Marcus Garcia is still out until next Saturday so Peter filled a huge gap. 

Just as in the varsity race, I was less than thrilled by the aggressiveness of our two front runners.  Like Alec and Chano, TnT ran solid times, but they never seemed to race with the passion and will that they could have.  Trust me - we'll work on that in this week's practices and races.  Tim and Tim placed 25th and 26th in the exact same time of 16:28, but we really needed them engaged more at the front of the race.  They got stuck in a running group behind the real race and our team score suffered a bit without them up in the top 15.

Behind the front two of Sandburg (117) and York (140), we were really close to a trophy finish: Harlem (174), OPRF (178), Wheaton North (183), and Palatine (195).  Seventh place was Lake Zurich some 24 points back.  With Gregorio and Garcia absent, it was up to our freshmen to score, and they came through with solid times and places.  Brian Smith was our #4 guy while Adam Vanderwiel and Christian Zambrano packed it up as our #5 and #6.  Jordan Jarrett ended up as our #7 man as he continues to move up and get closer to our top freshman group.  All four of these guys ran great times.  Our program rarely gets guys who have trained hard before so a really good time for a freshman, who is usually in his first 3 mile race, is 17:00.  Our top four went 17:09, 17:14, 17:14, and 17:34.  These times just about equal those put up by our star freshmen from a year ago.
 

Name	2008 PND	2009 PND	Improvement
Meincke	16:58	16:28	-30
Johnson	16:58	16:28	-30
Tomkiewicz	17:32	16:40	-52
Erdmann	21:24	19:22	-122
S. Much	-	19:25	-
Scheve	21:34	19:27	-127
Blihovde	21:10	19:58	-72
Z. Much	-	20:16	-
Ruston	-	20:57	-
Bobus	23:07	21:44	-83
Zubach	-	22:03	-

I also put together a chart comparing our top seven freshmen in this race to our top seven frosh at this meet in 2006, 2007, and 2008:
 

2006		2007		2008		2009
Name	Time	Name	Time	Name	Time	Name	Time
Larson	17:42	Bethke	16:49	Johnson	16:58	Smith	17:09
Bollman	17:48	Laskowske	16:55	Meincke	16:58	Zambrano	17:14
Pearson	18:24	Frey	17:17	Gregorio	17:01	Vanderwiel	17:14
Abram	18:29	Roehrborn	17:26	Tomkiewicz	17:32	Jarrett	17:34
Cannon	18:33	Baumgartner	17:58	Yosif	19:47	M. Bawa	18:22
Sund	18:47	Kwak	18:15	Blihovde	21:10	Clingerman	18:22
Smith	19:21	Gates	18:25	Erdmann	21:24	Stella	18:38
Murphy	20:37	Allen	18:30	Stover	21:32	Mars	18:59
Holbach	21:07	Kuerschner	18:40	Scheve	21:34	H. Bawa	19:05
Long	21:29	Alberti	19:43	Bobus	23:07	Kalfas	19:19

The future looks pretty bright.  York has been running their top frosh-soph team at this meet for the last 4-5 years, and they look beatable, especially if we insert Gregorio back into our F/S lineup.  Our sophs will still be without him next weekend at the Palatine Invite, but Marcus will be back to provide a huge lift in that race.  Can someone else step up at Palatine like Spencer Much did at Hinsdale and Blihovde did against Fremd?  We need another sophomore to serve as our #5 scorer this coming Saturday. 

Junior Varsity Race - Palatine Wins Another Invisible Trophy

I don't know how many years in a row we have won this JV race, but it seems like a lot now.  Of course, PND doesn't bother to score the race or give more than 15 medals, but our guys take a ton of pride in being one of the best second units in the state.  As usual, they pose above with our invisible trophy.  These pictures have become legendary over the last five years or so as we have acquired tons and tons of invisible hardware.  The picture really is the prize.  We have Gates acting creepy, Erik Bethke sitting spread eagle, and Tirth impersonating a boxer before a prize fight.  What's with that goatee?

The good news is that these guys raced well if not quite at the same level as a couple of our past units.  We got everyone all excited about being aggressive and competitive before the race, and I think they all went out a bit too hard.  Going into the back loop we had 7 in the top 10 and faded from those spots a bit.  We ended up placing 5 in the top 21 to outdistance Loyola by a score of 73-81.  Drew Shaler also did not end up in the results even though he finished right in front of Sund.  I'm not sure what happened there.  No shoe?  No chip?

Roehrborn, Cox, Kuerschner, and McCauley all broke 17:00 for the first time in a race so that constitutes some solid progress.  Sean McCauley had a very impressive race after I challenged him to add more to the team and race with the competitive fire he used to show.  John Pasowicz also was great.  He broke 18:00 for the first time and managed to hold off a swarm of 15 guys or so he tried to get him about 20 meters from the finish.  Alvaro Colin also gets the tough guy award of the day after he ran the last 2 1/2 miles or so with only one shoe.  Luckily, he recovered his spike right before he got on the bus to go home.
 

Name	2008 PND	2009 PND	Improvement
McGough	16:43	16:18	-25
Bethke	16:21	16:23	+2
Gates	18:10	16:25	-105
Shaler	17:48	16:26	-82
Patel	18:08	16:32	-96
Sund	17:41	16:34	-67
Roehrborn	-	16:53	-
Cox	17:23	16:56	-27
Kuerschner	17:03	16:57	-6
McCauley	-	16:57	-
Pasowicz	18:59	17:56	-63
Alberti	18:51	18:07	-44
Kovach	19:03	18:14	-49
Baumgartner	-	18:27	-
Colin	18:54	18:37	-17
McCall	19:27	18:37	-50
Norris	24:42	21:48	-174

Fremd Dual - Varsity Boys Keep the Streak Behind 5 in Top 7

Varsity Race - Pirate Varsity Runs the Five Minute Drill to Perfection

Ever since last fall, I knew that this race was going to be a challenge.  We ran a sloppy race to defeat a hungry Fremd team in last year's dual meet, and they returned all of their top seven guys this year while we graduated a substantial amount of our top seven.  I did the score just based on returnees after our dual and the MSL meet last year, and it was clear that we had some work to do.  Not only did we not want to lose our MSL dual streak, but to lose it to a crosstown rival like Fremd who hadn't beaten us since the 1980s would have been too much.

We set out this summer not just to get in shape for the season, but also to master Fremd's course over at Deer Grove East.  Our guys are very sick of it by now.  One thing we did at various times this summer was run really hard on the first mile of their course for five minutes to see how far we could get.  At the beginning we couldn't get within 150 meters of the mile mark.  By the Tuesday preceding our race, we had five guys past the mark.  Fred and I always vowed that we would never lose a dual running slow.  We would lose it in a flat out race against a faster team, not a team who had better kickers.

Our guys put the pedal to the metal and the race became a very fast one from the gun.  We had 8 guys by the mile in 5:01 or better and 15 under 5:06.  The strategy worked.  We threw a couple of Fremd's top six, Ricketts and Smaga, off the back of the real race by that point and isolated Fremd's top four against our top seven.  We had our back end barrel in the second mile, and we had seven in the top eight by just past the two mile mark.  I shut Bollman and Chano down with 800 meters left, but to Fremd's credit they never shut it down and competed all the way into the line. 

Fremd's Spiros Angelakos is a very tough runner, and we knew he would be a tough customer in this dual meet.  He clawed his way back into the race and caught not only our #3, Jeff Larson, but went up and passed Andy Mack, Fremd's #1, on the way into the finish.  Coach Bruce told me that no Fremd guy had ever run under 15:40 on this course, and two of them would do so on this day as he and Mack finished in 15:35 and 15:39.  Still, it was not enough.  Alec and Chano finished in twin 15:31's while we shut the door behind them very quickly: Larson 15:43, Laskowske 15:48, and Gregorio 15:52.  The score ended up Palatine 21, Fremd 38 with us going 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10.  Reuben Frey ran a beautiful race to not only hold off their #4 guy, but also to secure a spot on our PND trip.  Jeff Larson also ran an admirable race as he tried to distance himself from Fremd's kickers.  Ryan Wojdyla also ran a great race to nearly catch Aaron Ferst, who was Fremd's #3 runner on this day.  Overall, we took it to them, dictated the pace of the race, and ended up with a big win.  Check out our times against what these same guys ran last year on this course:
 

Name	2008 Fremd Dual	2009 Fremd Dual	Improvement
Bernardo	15:48	15:31	-17
Bollman	16:08	15:32	-36
Larson	16:38	15:43	-55
Laskowske	16:43	15:48	-55
Wojdyla	17:41	15:57	-104
Bethke	17:13	16:26	-47
Patel	18:30	16:54	-96
Sund	17:35	17:00	-35
Kovach	19:01	18:04	-57
Pasowicz	19:56	18:32	-84

If we take care of business against Conant, Barrington, and Schaumburg, we will secure an MSL record-tying 8 straight division titles.  Schaumburg won seven straight from 1995-2001 and we are tied with them right now, but the MSL record is held by Fremd from 1969-1976.  What a tribute to our kids' hard work it will be if we can tie that record!

Freshmen-Sophomore Race - Freshmen Take Care of Business

I loved the task that we threw on our freshmen's plates on Thursday.  We moved Gregorio, Meincke, and Johnson up to the varsity race and kept Peter and Marcus out with injuries so the duty to win fell mostly with our freshmen.  I finally challenged our sophomores beyond the top five to step up their level of play in practices and meets so this race also became a challenge to them.  Both groups came through with flying colors.

Ryan Blihovde helped set the early tone by blazing out inside our top three for the first mile, and he was grouped up early with Brian Smith and Christian Zambrano.  Brian really laid down a great effort in this one, shadowing Winter, who is Fremd's top soph, to the mile before passing him and trying to open up a lead.  He did create a 15 meter gap or so at one point, but Winter rebounded huge in the last 400 meters to run away with the win.  The loss up top didn't matter.  Our guys took the next seven spots to nail down another huge win and keep the F/S undefeated for the season in our MSL duals.  We went Smith (14:03), Zambrano (14:26), Vanderwiel (14:30), Jarrett (14:37), Clingerman (14:46), Mundeep Bawa (14:49), and Mars (14:53).  That's seven freshmen in a row to seal the deal!  What a sweet frosh team we have.  Other great races were turned in by Zach Stella (14:55) despite an achy foot, Blhovde (14:58), and the group of Christian Kalfas, Ryan Erdmann, Spencer Much, and Harmeet Bawa who all got in before Fremd's #5 guy.  Congrats on a nice win boys.

September 12, 2009 - Results from Hoffman Dual and The Palatine

Hoffman is always a team to be respected, especially since they have pumped out a number of tough front runners in recent years.  They returned Kyle Gonzales, 13th in the MSL last year and a 9:40s two miler, so we wanted to be ready to meet his challenge.  Our race plan was to follow for the first mile and then try and run under 5:00 for the second mile.  Gonzales let a couple of his teammates lead through a pedestrian 5:35 first mile before we opened it up.

We shot to a 1-6 lead just after the mile, and our guys kept pulling away as we crushed the second mile.  Chano split a 4:49 to lead the charge, and it became apparent in the back loop that Gonzales' fitness was not where it has been in the past.  He faded as our guys kept charging and we ended up 1-10 by the end.  Ryan Wojdyla and Justin Smith continued their runs of success by finishing in 15:52 and 15:57, and our split from 1-5 looked pretty: Chano 15:27, Bollman 15:36, Larson 15:43. Wojdyla 15:52, and Smith 15:57 for a 30 second gap.  Note as well that Laskowske sat out sick and that Gregorio ran in the under-level race.  That probably puts our gap at 30 seconds 1-7.  Obviously, Chano and Alec can run much faster (they both ran slower than at Hinsdale on a short course), but I also think our back end can turn it way up.  To become a really dangerous team, that split needs to be in the 20-30 second range when our front runners are at their best.  I think we can do it.

A ton of guys turned in all-time bests on the course despite the lagging opening pace:
 

Name	2008 Best	Hoffman Dual	Improvement
Larson	15:56	15:43	-13
Wojdyla	16:13	15:52	-21
Smith	16:16	15:56	-20
Frey	16:47	16:02	-45
Shaler	16:30	16:06	-24
Patel	17:28	16:17	-71
Sund	16:56	16:27	-29
Roehrborn	16:58	16:42	-14
Alberti	18:26	17:40	-46

Our emphasis was on a strong second mile and the splits sure demonstrate how we executed like a championship level team (top 12 guys):
 

Name	1 mile	2mile	Split
Bernardo	5:35	10:24	4:49
Bolman	5:35	10:33	4:58
Larson	5:35	10:39	5:04
Wojdyla	5:35	10:45	5:10
Smith	5:35	10:39	5:04
Frey	5:35	10:48	5:13
Shaler	5:35	10:58	5:23
Bethke	5:35	10:58	5:23
Patel	5:35	10:51	5:16
Meincke	5:35	10:56	5:21
McGough	5:35	11:13	5:38
Sund	5:35	11:20	5:45

Freshman-Sophomore Race - Gregorio Runs to Huge Victory

With Johnson and Meincke running varsity and Garcia and Tomkiewicz out hurt, Anthony Gregorio and our freshman had to hold the F/S team together.  Anthony ran to a 51 second win and a 2.5 mile course PR of 13:15, and our freshman stepped up to run as our 2-8 guys.  Hoffman was able to snag 4th place, but we took 12 out of the first 13 in a dominating 17-46 victory. 

Our freshman ran some very nice times.  Check out these comparisons with other Palatine frosh in their first race on the home course:
 

2006		2007		2008		2009
Name	Time	Name	Time	Name	Time	Name	Time
Grobner	14:09	Laskowske	14:02	Meincke	14:11	Smith	14:06
Larson	14:20	Bethke	14:19	Gregorio	14:12	Zambrano	14:26
Bollman	14:29	Roehrborn	14:36	Johnson	14:13	Clingerman	14:43
Abram	14:48	Frey	14:40	Yosif	16:37	Jarrett	14:43
Pearson	14:52	Baumgartner	14:48	Scheve	18:03	M. Bawa	14:44
Sund	14:55	Kuerschner	15:04	Bobus	18:07	Stella	14:46
Cannon	15:09	Kwak	15:26	Blihvode	18:23	Mars	15:10
Smith	15:25	Allen	15:57	Stover	19:16	H. Bawa	15:29
Murphy	16:16	Benzo	16:50			Kalfas	15:31
Long	16:25	Alberti	17:01			Squeo	15:44

The Palatine - Three Seniors Dip Under 30 Minutes

We run this workout less frequently than we did back in the 2002-2004 time period, but it is still a marker of our threshold fitness.  I know that the grass runs are still labeled "grass miles," but I measured them two or three years ago and each loop as I mark it is exactly 1500 meters.  Each grass mile is thus 109 meters short so use that to estimate your tempo pace and whether you were able to shift out of it on the track.

I updated all of the lists for this workout so see where your effort today fits into the larger history.  Check out the Top 50 Palatine times, the Best of the Rest, the Career bests list, and the grade level lists for seniors, juniors, sophomores, and freshmen.  The full results of the workout can be found here.  I also updated the All-Time list for the Junior Palatine.  Check out Ruston running faster than Smoody's time from freshman year.  Rusty - that might be the only time you sneak ahead of Smoo on an all-time list so relish the moment!

This workout is not a great predictor of race results, especially for speedier runners, but we ran a number of times today that bode well for this season.  Again, Laskowske sat out as he recovers from illness and J. Smith missed with an achy shin, but most everyone else outside of Marcus and Peter saddled up for the ride.  Chano ran two seconds off of his PR from sophomore track season, but much of that has to do with the pedestrian 3:57 opening pace.  He closed really well (5:09 last loop, 5:10 on track).  That 5:10 may be near the fastest we have had in this style of workout.  Morris' 4:50 phase record came when we pulled off the pace on the grass loops and really emphasized the track shifts.  Gregorio's 30:08 is a monster run bettered only by Chano's run in April of his sophomore year.  Chano also ran 29:06 in his fall cross country season.  Anthony did move in front of Morris' 30:14 from his sophomore year (Glenn went on to win the MSL and place 12th at state).  That is certainly the right company to keep!

Our depth continues to impress as Jeff, Alec, and Chano were supported by sweet runs from Wojdyla (30:13), Bethke (30:48), Frey (31:37), Patel (31:40), and Meincke (31:50).  Zach Gates also ran a nice 32:15 as he returns from injury.  Wojdyla continues to blow me away.  His 5:27 final mile on the track was our second best finish.  Check out today's results versus previous bests:
 

Name	Previous Best	9/12/2009	Improvement
Bernardo	28:52	28:54	+2
Larson	30:40	29:37	-63
Bollman	30:28	29:49	-39
Gregorio	32:42	30:08	-154
Wojdyla	33:11	30:13	-176
Bethke	32:51	30:48	-123
Frey	-	31:37	-
Patel	33:40	31:40	-120
Meincke	34:13	31:50	-153
Gates	34:44	32:15	-149
Johnson	32:03	32:15	+12
Shaler	36:04	32:21	-163
Roehrborn	35:58	32:40	-198
Sund	34:01	32:59	-62
Cox	34:16	33:16	-60
Kuerschner	33:41	33:51	+10
Kovach	37:46	34:08	-218
Alberti	37:23	34:30	-173
McCall	38:25	36:08	-137
Pasowicz	37:04	36:49	-15
Colin	36:49	39:10	+141
Baumgartner	37:15	39:10	+115
Erdmann	40:07	40:52	+45
Blihvode	41:34	41:16	-18

September 7, 2009 - Hinsdale Results and More Pictures

Above: Our top 7 guys pose with our 2nd place trophy from Hinsdale.  Back Row: Alec Bollman, Ryan Wojdyla, Justin Smith, Reuben Frey.  Front Row: Chano Bernardo, A.J. Laskowske, Jeff Larson.

We had a solid meet today at the Hinsdale Hornet-Red Devil Invite.  We placed fourth on the sophomore level, second on the varsity level, and fourth in the freshmen race.  Overall, the meet was very fast this year with fifteen guys under 15:50 in the varsity race.  Aaron Beattie of Neuqua Valley won the varsity race in 15:08 while Mike Fahey of Glenbard East took the sophomore race in 15:56.  The freshman race was very fast and deep.  We had eight guys run 12:00 or better and got fourth.  Our frosh ran way faster than most every class we've taken there in nine years but walked away without a trophy.

I was really pleased with our overall effort.  Our varsity ran well.  Any time that we have four to five guys under 16:00 at this meet, we end up in contention for a state trophy.  Other than 2004's great run (minus Finley), this team probably performed better than any of our other squads.  We finished in 15:24, 15:25, 15:30, 15:57, and 16:01 and got beaten by 20 points.  My conclusion?  We are good, but Neuqua is just better at this point in the season.  Hopefully we can give them a better run when we meet again.

I put together a huge comparison sheet of our program's three mile performances at this meet since the year 2000.  Check out how we stack up in relation to other squads.  I compared our runners at each spot (1-20), and the comparisons are favorable to this year's crew.  We registered only the 5th best performance by a #1 guy and the 3rd best by a #2 guy, but we were best at 13 positions, including #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, and #8 runners.  The stats are skewed a little by Finley not running in 2004 and Chano not running in 2007, but that does not slant the numbers too much.  The final analysis: we are deep and talented, but our All-State level guys will have to step up and race better for us to reach our full potential.  I put the season accolades earned at the bottom of each for further reference to show you how each team turned out.   

September 3, 2009 - Boys Sweep Wheeling to Pick Up First Win

We finally got to compete on Tuesday night after another long summer of training, and the results were impressive on both levels.  The varsity boys swept the first 16 spots to achieve a perfect score of 15-50 while our F/S won handily behind the 1-2 finish of Tim Meincke and Tim Johnson.  After a rather hilarious and embarrassing detour on the course, our girls varsity also managed to go 1-6 and win the race.  We roll into action again on Saturday at the powerful Hinsdale Hornet-Red Devil Invite against national and state power Neuqua Valley.  There should be good races on all levels.