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May 9, 2010 - Boys Place Second at 78th Annual Palatine Relays,
Girls Win
Well, the track season has officially gotten away from
me. I give you here today six meets worth of commentary.
Buying a house, helping 65 kids write research papers, and preparing my
charges for their AP English Language test has severely cut in to my web
updating habits. For those loyal and patient alums and fans, here is
everything you need to know about the past two weeks of our season.
We
have a number of great trends going within both our track team and our
distance group. We came together for powerful group performances at
the MSL West Division meet and the 78th Palatine Relays. Our field
event guys have just been outstanding with a number of performances that
place high up our All-Time event leaderboards. Tyler Jones has
thrown 167' in the discus to move to #3 All-Time, Chad Bobbit has thrown
over 52' to move into the #8 All-Time spot in the shot put, and Mykyta
Cheshko has jumped 21' 9" and 6'4" to establish himself as #11 long jump
man and the #7 high jump man. Lastly, sophomore Prentice Brooks has
really started to figure out the shot put. He launched a 47' 1"
throw to put his name as #8 in the sophomore shot put.
In the distance
group, Alec Bollman has started to show that he might go down as one of
our best track distance guys in school history. At the Palatine
Relays, Alec ran 1:53.5 to move to #3 All-Time on the 800 meter list.
Smoody's 1:50.71 school record is still way out of range, but Alec ran
within .3 of a second of Dave Kennedy's old school record of 1:53.2 from
1977. He was also quick to mention that he had bettered Coach
Miller's even older school record of 1:54.1. Then, this past Friday
night Alec stepped up to win the 3200 meters at the Hinsdale Central
McCarthy Invite in a big new PR of 9:23.8. That clocking is good
enough to tie Gordon Dreyfus' #10 All-Time clocking from 1965.
Dreyfus went on to win the state title in the 1600 that year so maybe it's
a good omen.
Other trends are also starting to look good. I
renewed our focus on the 3200 meter run this season after a lackluster
showing in that event last season, and we have responded well.
Reuben Frey ran a spectacular 9:46.4 on Saturday to demolish his PR of
10:07 set earlier in the outdoor season. Other significant PRs have
come from Lucas Roehrborn (10:17) and a ton of our freshmen. We had
six freshmen run between 10:30 and 10:50 on Friday night to give us our
deepest class of frosh athletes since I started here in 2002.
Performance List Update - I updated the
Leaderboards for all events.
History Update - I usually wait until
the end of the season to update the History pages, but Alec's great race
had me running to check where his 800 time fit in school history. He
established a new #3 time just .3 behind Dave Kennedy's old school record
of 1:53.2. Not bad for a guy we have always seen as a 1600 man first
and an 800 man second. I updated our list to include his new PR.
I chided Alec on Thursday for being tied for 22nd best and told him this
was a great time to move way up the list. Message received.
78th Annual Palatine Relays - Bollman's 1:53.5 Highlights Solid Day of
Action
F/S 1600 medley - We pulled Tim Meincke from his
leadoff spot on the DMR to anchor this medley relay and our gamble didn't
really pay off. Tim ran a near PR of 2:06 and change, but wasn't
able to come from behind on a couple of teams who were close. We
ended up settling for fifth or sixth place.
800 meter run - I
have never been able to get Alec to really put himself out aggressively in
this race. He has run 1:56 and 1:57 numerous times over the past two
years, but almost all of them have been negative split affairs that lacked
an aggressive start. Aggressive starts don't always guarantee fast
times, obviously, but I have always wanted to see if he can handle a
faster first 400 meters. Survey says: he can. The field was a
solid one, and the first 400 meters was a quick 54.2 after an opening
26-27. You could tell that Alec was on a mission from there as he
took the lead just before the 500 meter mark and scorched the backstretch
to a 1:22.8 600 meter clocking. His 30.7 final 200 meters shows that
our combination of speed training and aerobic work is clearly working.
His 1:53.5 sets him up as #2 in the state to Edwardsville's Dan Mazar, who
clocked 1:52.8 the week previous. It suffices to say that I could
have gone home happy after this race :-) I love my milers with big
speed, and Alec is obviously sitting on a great 1600 meter time in his
near future.
3200 meter
run - Chano Bernardo has been struggling a bit lately with illness and
fatigue issues. Those of you who know him know that his daily
schedule is virtually inhuman (he's up from 2:30 am to 9:00 pm at night
most days), and Chano just didn't look like he had his best on this day.
His 9:48 time was good for only fourth or fifth place. Hopefully we
can tweak some things with his training and resting habits to get him
feeling better in the coming weeks.
Distance medley relay - We
took a risk in this relay by pulling Tim Meincke out of the 1200 meter leg
and putting him on our medley. Anthony Gregorio gave a game effort
on the leadoff, but his split suffered after he went out in his 800 meter
PR. He ended up running 3:20, but we were well behind by that point.
Willie Filian ran a solid 52 split to keep us in it, and Ryan McGough was
solid again with a 2:02 800 meter leg. Tim Johnson got the stick in
fifth or sixth and was able to move us up a spot or two with a 4:30.3
split. He and Eric Peterson from Barrington locked horns in a great
battle down the last stretch, but Timmy J just got leaned at the wire for
third place.
4 x 800 meter relay - We doubled back Meincke,
Johnson, and McGough with Zach Gates running fresh, but our results ended
up being less than stellar. I think McGough's inspired 2:02 split
ended up getting us fourth or fifth after the first three legs only came
through in 2:07-2:08 splits.
1600 meter run - We rode Alec pretty
hard in this meet by putting him in three events, and I was interested to
see how he would handle his marquee race after running incredibly in an
event that isn't his specialty. Chris Cogswell from Barrington was
fresh here, and he led through the first 800 meters before Alec took
control and cruised to a 4:21.4 win. He once again showed that he
can run 60 seconds for the final circuit whenever he needs to. After
about 20 minutes of rest, he was also able to come back and anchor our 4 x
400 with a 50.5 PR split.
Other - Outside of
Alec, our distance guys didn't quite pull their weight in this one, and we
had to rely on some other event groups to score big points. Both
Mykyta Cheshko and David DiCristofano went over 21' to get us second in
the long jump, we had two guys jump over 41' to give us third or fourth in
the triple jump, and our shot and discus guys came through with first
place and second place performances in their events. Solid results
in the pole vault and high jump helped drive us to a second place team
performances.
MSL West Division Championship - Total Team Effort Secures 3rd Title in
4 Years
We hadn't quite put together a full team effort yet this
season so it was refreshing to see all of our guys pull this one out.
We preached about bringing emotion and team togetherness to this one, and
I was really proud to see guy after guy set PRs and score big points.
Our field event guys were phenomenal (winning five of the six events), and
Alec Bollman and Ryan McGough stepped up huge to score big points from our
group.
4 x 800 meter relay - We denuded this relay of its top two
performers to try and score bigger in the open races, and the result was a
fifth place showing. We actually ran a solid race through three legs
to be a close fourth place, but Drew Shaler was just overmatched against
the other big anchor legs. I want to commend Drew though. He
has worked hard for years and just blasted the first lap of his race to
get us up to third place for a brief moment. He really made a couple
of the other anchor legs go hard, and they ended up being non-factors for
the rest of the meet. It was a small piece of racing, but I admired
Drew's race a great deal.
3200 meter run - We wanted to score big
points in this one, but our strategy backfired and we only ended up
scoring fifth (Chano) and sixth (Anthony). The wind was howling at
Conant, and I asked Chano to try and take the race out on 4:40 pace from
the gun. He did just that and strung out the entire field. In
the end, though, three other guys just drafted off him, hung on through
five laps, and then drew away to score all of the points. Gregorio
did not go out on the early pace, and he managed to come from behind and
sweep up some guys from the front crew. I think they ran 9:51 and
9:55.
800 meter run - We took a risk early in the meet by
taking Ryan McGough and Alec Bollman out of our relay, and both had to
score big in order for us to maximize our points. Unlike the 3200
run, our strategy worked as we placed first and third for 16 big points.
Alec blasted the last 300 meters to win in 1:56.6, and Ryan McGough broke
2:00 for the first time in running 1:59.5. Congrats to Ryan on his
big PR!
1600
meter run - Alec doubled back in this race only 30-40 minutes after
his 800 meter run victory, and we knew that this one would be a challenge.
Barrington's Chris Cogswell, a state qualifier last year in this event,
was fresh, and Schaumburg's Pat Lesiewicz had a lot more rest after
anchoring his 3200 relay earlier in the evening. Lesiewicz set the
early pace through the 400 in 64 before the pace lagged to splits of 2:10
and 3:19. Alec took off at about the 450 meter to go mark and proceeded to
drop the field. He clocked the final circuit in just over 60 seconds
for a sweet 4:19.9 time and a dominating three second win. The other
story here was the gutty effort of sophomore Tim Johnson. We kept
Timmy J fresh for this race in hopes of another big point grab. He
ended up fifth after kicking past two guys in the last 200 meters and set
a new lifetime PR of 4:29.7. Not bad for a sophomore.
Hinsdale
Central McCarthy Invite - Bollman Reaches Top 10 in 3200 Run
Coach
Nalley surprised all of us by getting the team into this meet on late
notice. Our juniors and seniors had Prom on Saturday night so most
were only going to play limited roles at the Lisle Invite. We ended
up being able to take 14 guys in two vans to run at a loaded meet that
included Oak Park-River Forest, Downers North and South, Hinsdale Central
and South, and Bloom Township among others.
3200 meter run - I
hoped that this would be a really deep and hot race, but almost all of the
best 3200 meter runners elected to run the 1600 only in this meet. I
worried that Alec would be left alone to pace himself, but he ended up
getting a determined race from Hinsdale Central's junior star Billy
Fayette. The two burned it through the 800 in 2:16.7 before settling
in to splits of 3:29.9 (73.3), 4:42.0 (72.2), 5:56.0 (74.0), 7:09.2
(73.2). Bollman was clearly still feeling good and set out on his
own at about 1000 meters to go. He closed in 70.9 and 63.6 for a
slight negative split of 4:41.3. More proof that patient even racing
makes sense for both the 3200 and 5K distances. Tim Johnson learned
a couple of lessons. He went out too quickly in 4:46.1 before
backsliding to a 5:07 second mile and a slight PR of 9:53.7. I can
handle a guy putting himself in a race, but Timmy J still needs to learn
how to react to moves and use smart race tactics to manage his race.
Good lessons learned here.
800 meter run - Zach Gates has been
going out in 58-59 seconds in this race even though his 400 meter PR is
only 56.5 or so. I advised him to relax the first 200 meters and
pace himself evenly. He executed his race plan to perfection and
ended up a with a two second PR of 2:04.4. More proof that patience
matters and that smart racing can get us to our goals much more easily
than brute force.
1600 meter run - The wind had really picked up
before the 3200 meter run and kept getting worse as the night wore on.
It was evident in this stacked 1600 meter race as only Malachy Schrobilgem
from OPRF even dared to run a fast time. He was out ahead of the
group the entire time, but the rest ran as a cloistered pack through
relatively pedestrian splits of 66-67 and 2:14-2:15. The race moved
evenly from there with the main pack coming through the 1200 mark at
3:23-3:24. The race set up perfectly for Chano and Meincke, but
neither could find the fire in the last 400 meters to run a huge PR.
They settled for incremental improvements of 4:32.4 and 4:35.5. Not
bad, but the race was set up perfectly if either one had been able to
close with any force.
Carley Nalley Lisle Invitational - Reuben Frey
Smashes his 3200 PR
4 x 800 meter relay - I used this race as
an opportunity for four guys to try and improve their times enough to get
in to the MSL varsity meet. No one really was able to drop much
time. Temperatures were frigid with wind chills in the mid-40s at
the start. Our splits were Garcia (2:10.9), Wojdyla (2:09.0), Shaler
(2:11.1), and Cox (2:15.6).
3200 meter run - I have had a hard
time serving all of the good runners in our varsity group this season, and
Reuben Frey and Lucas Roehrborn were basically given this one opportunity
to run great times. Reuben had run 10:07 a long time ago, and I knew
that he was ready to pop a big one. Did he ever. He ran
perfectly even splits of 4:53.1 and 4:53.2 to record a massive new PR of
9:46.4. This race had me smiling all day long. Firstly, I
enjoyed it because Reuben is one of my all-time favorite competitors.
He races really tough in long races, and this huge new PR validated both
his toughness and the emphasis on relaxed aerobic racing. We are
learning to race smarter as a program, and I can't think of any better
example than this one. Lucas was also smart in this one. He
came through in 5:02 before hanging on to a 5:15 second split for a 20
second PR of 10:17. His time gives us 10 cross country returnees at
10:23 or better. Hopefully, our sophomores come through the next
couple weeks and really drop their 3200 times and give us 4-6 guys under
10:00 for next year's team. A.J. Laskowske would almost certainly
have broken the mark had he not gotten injured so I am really liking how
our returnee group is trending.
800 meter run - Chano and Tony
got a chance to drop their 800 meter PRs after running quite a few 1600
and 3200 meter races lately. They both ran solid, but not great in
setting season bests of 2:07.4 and 2:10.4.
1600 meter run
- Both Ryan McGough and Zach Gates are ready for huge time drops in this
event, but both guys missed being in the fast heat and had to make the
race themselves out of the slower section. They dawdled in the wind
through an opening 800 split of 2:22. Ryan held off a spirited
charge from one of his friends from Jacobs to win his heat and finish in a
new PR of 4:37. Gates was just off his best as his placed third in
4:42. Too bad they couldn't have been dragged along in a faster
section on a windy and cold day.
Hersey F/S Invitational - Distance
Crew Sets a Ton of PRs
4 x 800 meter relay - Our freshmen
have been incredible all year long in this event and the open 800, and we
got a slew of solid performances from them again in this race. It
was really windy so I had Tim Johnson lead-off and try to get us away from
the group. Rockton Hononegah's Dragan Simic ran away from the field
with a fine 2:02, but we came through the exchange in a clear second place
behind Tim's 2:06 split. From there we tried in vain to catch
Rockton behind solid runs from freshmen Andrew Clingerman (2:12), Jordan
Jarrett (2:12), and Zach Stella (2:11).
3200 meter run -
Marcus Garcia and Tim Meincke were trying to break 10:00 in this race, but
the stiff wind ensured that no PRs would be smashed on this day. We
tried to keep it moving through at 75 second pace by trading leads.
This tactic effectively strung out the field and reduced it to four guys:
our two, Schaumburg's Pat Swiech and Hersey's freshman star Robert Somary.
Swiech ran smart before using his speed to run away to the win in the last
300 meters. Garcia ran 10:06 to nearly equal his PR while Meincke
faded badly in the last 800 meters to run 10:24 and get nipped at the
line. They finished second and fourth to score some big team points.
800 meter run - I had Tim Johnson double back from the relay as
part of a 4 x 800, 800, 4 x 400 workout day, and he responded with one of
his best efforts of the season. Hononegah's Simic ran away with the
win just as in the 4 x 800, but Tim made a spirited charge to get into
second place at the 600 and then to hold off Hersey's Chris Colletto in
the final stretch. His 2:05.8 was a new PR and demonstrated how much
toughness Timmy J can have when he is competing at his best.
400
meter run - The theme for our freshman class is speed, and Rob Hank
and Jordan Jarrett flashed some in this race. Rob stormed from
behind to win his heat in a new PR of 55.1 while Jordan finished second in
his race with a huge new best of 56.3. They placed third and seventh
overall.
1600 meter run - Wind again played a factor in this race
even though it had lessened from the start of the night. The field
was stacked with most of the best F/S runners in the area, but no one
wanted to be the sacrificial pacer so it went out fairly slow through
splits of 70-2:22. Everyone knew that it was coming back in a big
negative split, and I was proud of Anthony Gregorio for putting his nose
right in there. He was all out from about 500 meters to go and
simply lacked the speed to kick with the two Schaumburg guys and
Prospect's Mike Thill. Tony's 4:37 was a new 4 second PR.
Peter Tomkiewicz also set a two second PR of 4:46.9 in a race that saw him
persevere through a brutal, bloody spike mark in the first 20 meters of
the race. Hooray for war wounds and new PRs! I love Peter's
toughness as a racer, and he once again showed why he will be a big factor
for us in the next two CC seasons.
Prospect/St. Viator JV Meet -
Frosh 3200 Run Times Headline a Great Night
For most guys, this is
the final official meet of the year even though we run some season-ending
time trials the week of the MSL meet. I dubbed it long ago as the
"JV State Meet," but the meet has become much more known for the annual
McCathlon competition. Started by Mike McCain in his senior year,
the McCathlon is simple: in a meet with no relays, a man simply runs every
track event excluding the hurdles. A typical McCathlon thus consists
of the 3200 meter run followed in short order by the 100 meter dash, the
800 meter run, the 400 meter dash, the 1600 meter run, the 200 meter dash,
and an obligatory 4 x 400 meter relay. This year, John Pasowicz,
Tirth Patel, and Alvaro Colin successfully completed the challenge.
Official times can come later. I'm not sure if anyone has kept track
of the best performance overall since McCain's first one, but Tirth ran
pretty well.
3200 meter run - I set this race up as a
freshman 3200 meter bonanza, and our young guys paid off in a big way.
I have fretted for much of the season about the lack of aerobic
development in this class, knowing that we would have to get over that
hurdle this summer. Our times had started to come down a bit over
the last three weeks, and our speed numbers were certainly good.
This race ended up being the one I was looking for. I had everyone
run it, and Coach Sheehan told me that it came down to Jordan Jarrett,
Brian Smith, and Zach Stella sprinting for the win. Jordan used his
speed to hit the tape first in 10:31.1 and was followed closely by Stella
(10:31.7) and Smith (10:32.1). Another group of Christian Zambrano
(10:47), Adam Vanderweil (10:48), and Mundee Bawa (10:49) closed soon
after. Other new freshman PRs included Matt Szablowksi (11:01),
Emanuel Rosales (11:48), and Sebastian Ramirez (11:48). Kendall Cox
also ran 10:55 in his first attempt at the distance, and Chris Ruston set
a slight new PR of 12:24.
For a little perspective, we now have six
freshman with PRs less than 10:50. As it did in cross country, this
class lacks an up-front star, but our depth is unparalleled in my nine
years here at Palatine. I looked through the old leaderboards from
2002 on and our stats look like this:
If my experience shows anything, it is that someone will emerge from
this group to become a star. Most guys in that list have not done
a lot of off-season running as of yet, and we could become dangerous if
this group develops a work ethic similar to some of our other classes.
We have the thing you can't teach: speed. It'll be exciting to see
this group grow in the next couple of years.
800 meter run - I
set this up as a match race between Joe Mars and Rob Hank for a possible
spot on our F/S 4 x 800 team at the MSL meet. Joe came through
with a huge new PR of 2:11.6. Rob Hank put up a good fight and
also ended up with a new best of 2:12.4. Peter Tomkiewicz also
dropped his PR another couple of ticks to 2:13.1. The numbers on
our freshmen in the 800 are even better than the ones I posted above for
the 3200. We still don't have that big star yet in this event, but
our open 800 times now include: Joe Mars (2:11.6), Zambrano (2:11.6),
Hank (2:12.4), Stella (2:12.6), Jarrett (2:14.1), Clingerman (2:14.4),
Smith (2:15.8), and Szablowksi (2:16.9). That list looks even
better considering that Clingerman has split 2:06.9 and Jarrett and
Stella have run 2:11 and 2:10 in the relay. We are stacked for the
future in this event. I have never had more than three guys go
under 2:15 in the same track season! This year, six are already
under that mark.
1600 meter run - Ryan Wojdyla has suffered the
fate of a good runner on an even better team, and he has not gotten to
race as often as he deserves. He made the most of his opportunity
here to run a PR of 4:43.6 and win the race. Drew Shaler showed
that his hard work has paid off as he finished in 4:46.8 while fellow
senior Brian Sund ran a PR of 4:50.9 in his last official race.
The other big PR of the night in this one came from Tyler Squeo, who
dropped 17 seconds from his best in a 5:32 effort.
April 27, 2010 - Pirates Win Varsity and F/S MSL West Titles
We had a really great team night on Monday as we won both the varsity and
F/S titles in the six team MSL West meet. More to come in the next
day or so... I did update the leaderboards with some new PRs so you
might be able to figure out how some things went.
April 25, 2010 - Too Much Track: Results from Four Meets in Five
Days
I never thought I could approach a track breaking point, but
this week might have been it. We had four meets in five days due to
a couple of F/S meets thrown in on Monday and Wednesday. On top of
that, my wife and I sold our town house and began to frantically look for
somewhere else to live. Oh yeah...my kids are throwing up and sick.
Up next is the MSL West Division meet tomorrow night at Conant. Come
out and watch the boys try to win the regular season MSL West title.
Performance Lists - We had a ton of all-time bests and season bests
this week. I'm pretty sure I captured everything in the
updated
distance leaderboards.
Alumni Updates - It's been on the
LetsRun.com message board since yesterday, but Steve Finley's University
of Virginia 4 x 800 meter relay team won the Penn Relays and ran the
fastest time in the world this year. He ran third leg in a shade
over 1:50 and then got the stick to freshman sensation Robbie Andrews, who
kicked down 2008 800 meter Olympian Andrew Wheating of Oregon to take the
win. I included the FloTrack video of the race below. In other
news, Coach Miller told me that Mat Smoody ran 48.36 in the open 400
meters this weekend at ISU and was also on their winning 4 x 400 team.
This shows that Mat is ready to run that first breakout 800 meters of his
collegiate career.
Wheaton Warrenville Red Grange Invite -
Bollman, Meincke Run to 1600 Meter Wins
4 x 800 meter relay - Per
our usual, we gave our JV guys a chance to run in this relay as our
front-line runners went after seed times and PRs with fresh legs. We
ran in the 8:40s with some solid efforts. Drew Shaler's 2:08 split
was the top time of the evening.
3200
meter run - We scratched Tim Johnson from the A heat here due to a tender
hamstring so that basically imploded our lineup. Tim is fine and
will run on Monday, but his absence resulted in Anthony Gregorio moving up
to A, Ryan Wojdyla jumping into the B heat, and A.J. Laskowske retaining
the C spot in his first race back from a stubborn quad injury. A.J.
was able to get through the 1600 in 5:02 before it became apparent that he
simply lacks the fitness and sharpness he needs to break 10:00. He
faded to 10:27 and 4th place, but seemed to recover well afterward and
show little effect from his injury.
Ryan Wojdyla had a great chance to win his heat, but ran out of gas in
the last 800 meters after pushing pace in the third half mile. He
hit the 1600 mark in 4:56 among a group of five leaders. I yelled at
him to push pace and try to break them, but he just couldn't get rid of
them before the kick started. He hit the 2400 mark in 7:27 before
scratching and clawing all the way to the line to get third in a new PR of
9:59.4. Everyone who ever thought Dilla would break 10:00 should
raise their hand proudly. It'll be a small crowd.
The fast heat
was a bit of a weird race for Anthony since it lacked a good group of
middle-class racers. One of the Waterman twins from Wheaton North
battled it out with Naperville North's Bob Guthrie as the pair ran right
on the meet record. I'm pretty sure that Waterman broke it by .01 of
a second in running 9:20 while Guthrie was a close second in 9:23.
Anthony did well to stay out of that race early on, and he came from
behind nicely to get up for fourth place in a new PR of 9:52. His
splits were a solid 4:51-4:59, and I was really proud of his patience and
mid-race perseverance. He had a great mid-9:40s clocking going until
the last half. Hopefully we can add the finish as we sharpen up.
800 meter run - I screwed things up in this one. This meet has gone
C-B-A in its heat order every year that I have gone, but it turns out that
they inverted it to A-B-C this year. I had Marcus Garcia heading to
the line getting ready to compete in the C heat when all of a sudden I see
him running frantically across the field. He figured that all of the
big and fast- looking kids were not a part of his race. He was right.
Ryan McGough sprinted across the field tearing his sweats off as he went
as Sheehan tried to stop the starter. Ryan got about 5 seconds of
relief on the line before the gun. Disaster should have
ensued, but McGough still managed a 2:01.2 lifetime PR. He wasn't
able to compete at the front end of the race like we'd hoped, but I was
proud that he could run so well despite my blatant mistake.
In the B race, Zach Gates got spiked really badly at the 120 meter mark
and never really recovered from the shock. He still had the
shoe-print of a fellow competitor outlined on his quad the next morning.
He managed a 2:07 time that got him an earful from some mean coach, but I
hope that he earned a valuable lesson about positioning. Those gaps
that stay open on the F/S level get closed a lot quicker in a varsity
race. In the C division, I gave Marcus Garcia a shot even though he
had never broken 2:14.0 this season. He came through with a nice
2:09.0 PR that should bode well for his near future in the 1600 and 3200
meter races, which are his specialty.
1600 meter run - Alec and I
have talked all season about developing a variety of race strategies so
that he is prepared for championship racing. I wanted him to take
this on level 64 second splits from the gun to 3:12, but it just didn't
happen. The weather was perfect, but Alec just wasn't ready yet to
run that kind of pace from the gun all by himself. He hit the 400 in
65, gapped the field with a 66 (2:11.1), but then settled in a bit much in
hitting 3:17.4 at the 1200 meter mark. By that point, Waterman from
Wheaton North had caught him, and he had Prospect's Albert Ciolek in tow.
What ended up materializing was a near repeat of last year where Alec held
off Waterman in a race all the way to the line and won in 4:23.9.
The good news is that he repeated the feat this year, but in 4:17.8
(4:18.01 FAT). Neither of us was blown away by the race tactics, but
I was very proud of his competitive spirit. Alec is clearly in
better form at every checkpoint than a year ago, and he ran 4:16.8 and
4:18.1 in the IHSA State Prelim and Final then. Hopefully, I can
help him to peak out just as hard and go for even bigger hardware this
year. There's still 4-5 weeks left so a lot can happen in what is
always one of the best events of the AAA boys meet.
In the B and C
divisions, we were trying to complete the sweep. I wanted Chano
Bernardo to go after the field at level 66-67 pace, but he was much too
passive and gave the race away to a quartet of kickers with lagging laps
of 68-71 for a 2:19 800 meter split. The rest of the race played out
like too many Chano races - a valiant middle surge that was easily covered
and immediately followed by a frenetic kick that he can rarely match.
Chano needs to run to his strength in these races to have a shot to win.
In the C heat, Tim Meincke chilled through 600 meters before I gave him a
verbal nudge to get out of the pack and take the lead. He promptly
did that and proceeded to string out the field to the 1300 meter mark.
A couple of athletes made a game run at him from that point on, but Monkey
withstood all charges to take the win in 4:36, tying his season best.
Other - We didn't hit the ball out of the park as a whole, but a
number of great efforts stood out. For me, Mykyta Cheshko's 6' 3"
and 21' 9 1/4" double in the high jump and the long jump was our
performance of the meet. Mykyta pulled the Bob Beamon-style PR as he
had never jumped over 20' and completely jumped over that mark to nearly
get into the 22' range. He placed second in the A level in both
events. Some other good marks included a 23.4 placing effort from
junior Will Stein in the 200 meter dash and six medals for our throwers in
the shot put and discus. I don't think that any of them set PRs, but
medals in all three divisions of each were quite impressive. On the
track, Eric Debellis managed a medal in the 110 high hurdles with a
lifetime best while we had a nice season best of 44.5 in the 4 x 100
relay.
Libertyville F/S Relays -
Four Super Sophs Demolish 30 Year Old 4 x 1600 Record
4 x 1600 meter
relay - We set out to break the meet record in this race
even when we had no idea what it was. When we got to the meet, it
turned out that the record was 18:55 by a quartet of Libertyville runners
in 1980. That meant our foursome of Tim Johnson, Marcus Garcia,
Anthony Gregorio, and Tim Meincke would have to average 4:44 per guy with
much of the race being run time-trial style and out in space. Their
orders were to run level 70 second splits until a lap to go and then try
to kick from there. The first three executed to perfection.
Johnson hit the 1200 in 3:30 before turning in a 64 second split to finish
in 4:34.9. Marcus was up next, hitting splits of 2:21 and 3:32 en
route to a finishing 4:44.9. Anthony Gregorio put a great charge
into breaking 4:40 for the first time as he aggressively charged to 3:28
before finishing in 4:40.9. Tim Meincke got a little ambitious with
a 66 second opening circuit and he suffered through a 74 second third lap
before recovering nicely to run 4:42.3. Our time of 18:42 destroyed
an old record and shows once again what a special group of sophomores we
have. We are so good right now that our #5 man - Peter Tomkiewicz -
was left off the relay even though he ran 4:48 the night before.
Congrats! I should soon have a picture of the guys (courtesy of
Steve Johnson).
4 x 800 meter relay - I was hoping to pull off
the distance double with an entirely fresh crew of guys in this one, and
our boys did not disappoint. Zach Stella led off in 2:10, and we
didn't look back from there. Peter ran 2:15 to extend our lead on
second leg, and then got it to Christian Zambrano and Jordan Jarrett, who
ran 2:15 and 2:14 splits, respectively. Our time ended up being
8:55.
1600 medley relay - Andrew Clingerman anchored this one for
us in an okay 2:13, but we got beaten from the gun in this one.
Freshman Rob Hank ran a PR 55.7 on leadoff, but was smoked by a frosh-soph
guy from Waukegen who ran 50.8! We ended up fourth overall.
Other
- We set the shot put relay record for this meet with a solid 121' 8"
total distance. It's only the second year that they have done the
field events relay style, but we'll take it. The highlight throw of
the night was certainly Prentice Brooks' big PR of 42' 9". He should
be a force for us in the weights over the next couple of years. He
also recorded a 106' 6" discus toss as we placed fourth in that event.
Our other sterling performer was Andre Adams who was solid in the long and
high jumps, but also popped a 37' 9" effort in his first attempt at the
triple jump.
