| Girls 800 | Boys 800 | Girls Mile | Boys Mile | Boys Steeple | Girls Steeple | Girls DMR | Boys DMR |

800 winners go hard from the start; Lambie runs away from everyone; Vazquez seizes opportunity when Magness fades; Trotter titanesses close with record DMR; Saline MI makes no-name boys DMR a thriller; NM's Urbina wins first steeple try; Heather Iatauro wins girls steeple.

Girls 800

Every now and then a great athlete with a moxie to really run from the gun will dare to take a championship race by the scruff of the neck and shake it until unloads a championship. Saturday night, multi-talented sophomore Katya Kostetskaya was that athlete.

“(It was just) like, Run as fast as you can!” said Orem, Utah’s Heidi Magill.

Taking the lead in the girls 800 after the gun and hitting the 200 mark at 28 seconds, Katya left the field strung out and straining to maintain contact. Even the great Magill, a first-lap bullet herself, was forced to hang on and hope the Russian-by-way-of-Jonesboro, AR would die. She didn’t, taking the title in a near-meet-record 2:05.95, No. 3 all-time in this meet.

“That first lap was really fast,” said McGill (2:06.74), still trying to catch her breath. “I was hoping for a 61, but we almost got a 59. Whoo!”

Did Katya, the daughter of all-time Russian great Olga Dvirna (3:54.23 1500m) and Aleksandr Kostetskiy (1:45.17), intend to go out so fast the first 200 and 400? “Yes (to the 400), but I didn’t know I ran 28 because my coach was yelling at me, Go ahead faster! And I thought I started out pretty slow.”

Hardly. Shannon Leinert (Wildwood, MO), Trisa Nickoley (Tecumseh, KS) and Georgia Kloss (Atlanta, GA) tried to stay up with Katya and Magill as best they could. Nickoley eventually moved into third with 200 to go and held on in 2:08.40.

“Katya’s really good,” said MaGill. “It was fun; I look forward to racing her again.”

The amazingly versatile Kostetskaya was also entered to run the 400 hurdles, but eschewed that event after she and her coach checked out the wind conditions Saturday morning. She is traveling to Russia Monday morning to eventually compete in that country’s national championships for a berth in the World Youth Championships.

Boys 800

Leading the race wasn’t really in Derrick Hoye’s game plan Saturday night, as the Columbus, OH junior normally likes to make his play off someone else’s pace. But compelled by the long stagger and his first championship try to get out fast, Hoye embraced the role of both leader and finisher, taking the boys 800 in 1:50.34.

“Usually I like being second (early on),” the winner laughed later. “(But) I got out quick and wind up being in the lead.”

Given the situation, Hoye quickly made the best of it. He allowed the pace to slow from a 26-second 200 to :54 at 400, then put in a hard move at 500. “I wanted to go on the back straight to get the kickers out of the race and hope I had enough left to hold off the distance guys. I do (consider myself a kicker), but I’ve never competed on a national level before, so I don’t know what kind of kicks they have.”

At 400, Christopher Patrick (Salem, AL), Cody Harper (Albuquerque, NM) and Jeremy Kruidenier (Champaign, IL) trailed. Then several moves were made between 500 and 700 to take the race. Harper and Kruidenier both pushed hard around the 600 mark. Harper said he was trying to take the lead before the curve to get to the inside of the lane. “But I didn’t have any energy left,” he said. “I don’t know, I just tightened up.”

“I was planning on going with 150 left, but a guy came up on me on the outside; I had to go,” said Kruidenier. “I thought I was going to get him. I just didn’t have enough.”

The final push was made my Tuckahoe, NJ’s John Richardson, who had a great final straight but ran out of track. He wound up 2nd, though (1:50.67), ahead of Kruidenier (1:51.32) and Liam Boylan-Pett of Bath, MI (1:51.50). “I made my move with 300 meters to go, but it looked like everyone made their move with 300 meters to go today,” he said. “But the last 150 meters, I was moving pretty good ... Five more meters I might have been able to get the victory.”

Girls Mile

It took all of about 250 meters to make the race her own. From then on out, the girls mile was the Ari Lambie show, the Harvard, MA senior receiving her expected coronation as the year’s best 4-lapper. While her 4:39.05 was just under two seconds off the amazing 4:37.23 of her state meet, it still crushed the meet record and left defending champ Megan Kaltenbach and 8 others over 10 seconds back.

With other PRs of 2:06/10:11 for 800/2-Mile, as well as her win in the Foot Locker cross country Northeast regional, Lambie was easily the best and most versatile distance runner for 2003. After Nikki Bohnsack (Rockford, MI) took the field out in 37 for the first 200, Lambie scooted in front and ran 68-70 pace the rest of the way, hitting 72.7, 2:20.9 (68.2) and 3:29.8 (68.9), then used 69.2 to finish.

Basically, as soon as Lambie knew it was a little slow, she took off. “I knew if I took it out at a fast pace, I was going to lose girls right away,” she said. “So I needed to make it past then; get the fast pace underway. I wasn’t really going for the (national) record, but I really wanted my first national title. So I was racing the other competitors today, not the clock.”

When the assembled media laughed, basically saying, You could have fooled us, she laughed. “No, I didn’t know how close they were; I heard them cheering Megan right behind me, so I just kicked it as hard as I could. The heat was hard; I felt kind of tired before halfway, and I got a little worried, but I thought to myself that the others girls are just as tired.”

With that warmth and next week’s junior nationals ahead of her, Lambie really didn’t think about pushing for a real fast last lap and the record. “No, I mean, I was like, Oh my God, another lap?” But she was also lifted by the fans. “I’ve never heard a crowd this loud; they were screaming. And I knew a lot of it was for me, so I used that energy.”

Lambie also admitted the title was sweet vindication for last fall, when she won Foot Locker NE, but was hampered by health problems at nationals.

Kaltenbach gamely gave chase in defense of her title, really the only competitor that did. But as the gap finally yawned to nearly a straightaway, the “pack,” led by Maggie Infeld (University Heights, CA), started to close on her. But Megan bore down the final straightaway and wound up with a 2.58 margin on the junior (4:49.28-4:51.86).

“That’s the one thing I was happy about,” the Aurora, CO standout said, regarding her finish. “But Ari ran really good and I couldn’t catch her.”

In truth, though, Kaltenbach’s inability to stay closer mystified her. “I don’t know; I think it’s just the (lack of) sharpness; I mean me, my sister and Brent (Vaughn), all of our legs hurt really bad for some reason. I think it was maybe having state a month ago and not any races. Maybe I’m not in the shape that I thought.

“After state I was training really well, but I just couldn’t respond today,” she added. “I was telling myself to go, like three times, and I just couldn’t respond. Last year just felt so easy. Kaltenbach will be running the 3k at junior nationals next week, an event which she thinks she’s in better shape for.

Boys mile

Both 4-lap races at AOC Saturday night had prohibitive favorites. Ari Lambie’s hard pace for all but the first 200 meters or so of the girls’ race forced her competitors to run fast and pray. But when 4:01-miler Steve Magness slipped back to 3rd before the halfway point of the boys affair, “Plan B” went into effect. A handful of other young stars had serious designs on winning and three of them made serious bids.

But the best execution came from Sam Vasquez. He made the final move inside of 200 meters to go and flew down the straight to a big PR 4:03.87 and victory over what was being called the best boys mile field ever assembled. Six others broke 4:08 in his wake, including runner-up Chris Solinsky (4:05.30), who had made his move with 300 left, and super soph Jeff See (4:06.07) who rocked the house with a gutsy finish that ripped Alan Webb’s national class record from 1999 (4:06.94) out of the books.

Vasquez pretty much bided his time in the middle of the group the first three circuits. “At the end of the third lap I passed everyone (else) and caught up to Magness (in third at the time),” the Palm Coast, FL senior said. “I felt like, I can win this, I can win this – and I saw Magness kind of fading. So when I got in front of him, then I saw Solinsky going, so I went right with him, until the last 100, then I tried to kick.”

At first, the race had appeared to take its “Plan A” form, with Magness (Spring, TX) taking the lead from fellow Texan Eric Stanley and towing the field through 440 in 60.0. But it was not to be for this year’s revelation, who had run 4:09 earlier in the day trying to rally his FMR club to victory in the 4 x 1 Mile. Did the effort negatively affect him?

“I think it did,” the senior said. “I mean, this morning – I don’t know what it was. This morning I felt great going through the half. But I didn’t see any chance, so I backed off a little bit. But this afternoon I felt like crap going through the half, so much slower.

“I wanted to push the pace, because I figure that’s what’s worked all season,” he continued, “but after the first lap, I could tell my legs were just crap. So I figured I’d back off the pace and recharge for a kick, nationals but I didn’t have anything.”

Stephen Pifer (Glen Carson, IL) and Solinsky (Stevens Point, WI) took over at that point, taking the field through 880 (2:02.8), 1100 (2:34.3) and 1320 (3:06.1). Vasquez and See were closing fast at that point and the slowing pace had created kicking opportunities. With 300 left, Solinsky made his bid, going for the win after narrowly missing Gabe Jennings’ state mile mark the week before and carrying not only the best 3200 in the nation into the meet, but also his Foot Locker CC champ status.

Well, the move didn’t quite hold up, but the senior was able to take solace in a PR and a great effort. “I can’t take anything away from it because it’s my best time,” he said. “I wanted to be in the front the whole time and it went well; I was able to pull it off. I made my move a little early; probably should have waited 50 to 100 meters later. But I’m happy with a PR.”

“I wanted to come in here and win it,” he added, “but things didn’t come together quite as well as I hoped to. … Coming into this weekend, I thought everyone would wait until 200 to go, so I wanted to go early and put a gap on everyone. But I don’t know what it was, I just didn’t have my legs at the end. But hey, I put it all out there and I was on the track at the end of the race.”

See hung with the kickers and held third, nearly collapsing at the finish. The effort was rewarded with his second big PR in 2 weeks and Webb’s soph mark, joining the Nike runner and legendary Jim Ryun on the list of 10th-grade record holders.

“He did exactly the same thing last week, an all out effort, you know?” said See’s coach, David Fultz. “We talked about going through the half 2:02-2:04 and I said you might be last. But he’s such an instinctive runner. His last lap is always awesome.”

Meanwhile, Pifer was a victim of those kicks, but rallied himself at the end to take 4th (4:06.50), ahead of Victor Gras (4:06.93), Magness (4:07.73) and Leonel Manzano (4:07.83). He didn’t regret having done a lot of the work in the middle of the race. “That’s how I’ve raced all year … I like to get out fast, right around low 2:00s and then just keep hammering away … After the 1200 I was feeling relatively pretty strong … so I threw in an abrupt move at the beginning of the last lap to see where everyone was at; little gut check. Solinsky started moving up on me in the backstretch, so I tried to go with him. And then once he started pulling away, I just kind of started freaking out mentally, but at 150 I kind of caught a second wind; I was like, I want to hang in there. It was a PR, I was pretty happy with it.”

Meanwhile, Vasquez will continue a quest for fast times at juniors, the Maine Distance Classic and in Boston. We could have two sub-4 runners this year after all. “My coach (Peter Hopfe) knows what he’s doing. It’s worked, doing exactly what my coach told me to do. I knew I had one of the fastest kicks; I’m more an 800 meter guy.” Indeed, Vasquez has run 1:50, plus the 4:05.46 in Minnesota for the full mile that built his confidence. “It helped a lot because before that I was only running 1500s, so I wasn’t really sure I could hit a 4:05. But (after the 4:05) I knew I was one of the top guys.”

Girls DMR

As the distance medley relay runners lined up Saturday night to close out the girls program at the 2003 AOC, another great field had been assembled. But honestly, was anyone really thinking “high school record?”

No, not from Bronxville, NY (well off their best in the 4xMile). No, not from Rockford, MI (lacking the heavy hitters of the past). No, not from Bay Shore, NY (great 4x8, but not yet under 12:00). And no, not even from defending champ and No. 2 all-time Red Bank Regional, NJ, whose Trotter sisters had looked sub-par the night before, unable to finish fast off a modest 2-mile pace.

My, how quickly things change.

Amanda Trotter and Maryliz McCurdy of Bay Shore pumped up the volume full blast from the get-go, waging a fierce 1200 battle that each completed in 3:32. Having already created a 2-team race, both squads weighed in with solid-strong 400 and 800 legs, but Bay Shore built up a 3-second lead. And when cross-country star Laura Cummings blasted the first lap of her 1600, it looked like the Long Island team would grab its second title and possibly that HSR.

But Red Bank had one Trotter left to play. Displaying impressive patience and that burning will to win, Katy reeled in her foe and surged through the tape with a 4:48.2 leg. That made the final time a jaw-dropping 11:37.86 for the Jersey school, ripping down the San Lorenzo Valley CA mark (11:41.28) from the 2000 Penn Relays (plus their own meet record 11:42.17) and sending the twin titanesses off to Stanford in grand style.

Flushed with that glow of success, but ever modest, sister Amanda (69.2/2:21.5/3:32.3 to be exact) quickly gave credit to the competition McCurdy provided in the opening leg. “That was the key,” she said. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without the competition.” On the other hand, she added that the PR effort felt, well, almost effortless – thanks to the energy of the moment. “It wasn’t that tough – I mean, it was hard, but you’re at nationals and it’s so exciting. Knowing it was my last race, that helped, too. I wasn’t happy with the 2-mile yesterday, but I knew I had another chance to make it up, so I’m happy.”

Junior Elizabeth Mayer followed with a 60.5, losing the lead to Bay Shore (Kellie Castro 58.8), but staying close. “I’ve been around 60 all season and my goal’s been to break 60,” she said. “I ran hard and I just wanted to stay up with the leader. I just stuck with her.”

Then Red Bank freshman Christina Nelson was faced with tough Bay Shore senior Danica Dupuy. Dupuy hit 2:14.7 to Nelson’s 2:16.8, and Bronxville came up for a close third, but the Nelson undeniably did her job. Her previous PR was 2:19.

“That was definitely my best 800 by far,” she said. “I was pushing myself as hard as I can and it was just helpful to have someone there to know about where I am and for pacing myself correctly. But when I saw her opening the gap, I figured she wouldn’t get too far because we were kind of near the end, and I had so much confidence in Katy; it was just great knowing she was there. I was really happy the way the race turned out. That’s all I could do.”

It was then Bay Shore’s Cummings, 4th in the FL CC finals, vs. Red Bank’s Katy Trotter's 2nd in the same race. Some combination of the sophomore’s excitement, or desire to finish off her opponent early, led to a blazing 66-second opening lap as the crowd noise increased. But the next circuit was 76 and the anticipation of a come-from-behind effort built. Trotter charged into the lead during the third lap and the next question was whether or not there would be a record set. Soon, the question was “by how much?”

Sister Katy’s 4:48.2 was a PR and was right up with Megan Kaltenbach’s runner-up effort in the open mile for the 2nd-best 4-lap effort of the meet (after Ari Lambie). Katy, too, gave credit to her opponent. “It was definitely key to have Laura Cummings there,” she said. “If she wasn’t there, I don’t know if I could have done that.”

Trotter knew the pace set by Cummings was fast and prepared herself to have a chance. “I just tried to keep focused and say, Ok, you just have to run your own race and things will fall into place,” she said. “I have (been able to come back in races), so that gave me a little confidence; usually that’s how I like to race, actually, I like to have people in front of me so I can chase them down. I knew she was a very talented runner, but I was confident I could catch up to her.”

Cumming’s 4:58.6 leg still put Bay Shore No. 7 on the all-time list – and there’s little doubt this school, and Cummings, will be back. Bronxville (11:53.07) and Rockford (11:56.41) led 4 more schools under 12 and Turpin, OH led 5 more under 12:12.

Boys DMR

No one knew quite what to expect in the final event of the meet, For the first time in years, there wasn’t a strong favorite or a team with overwhelming credentials. Thus, it was fitting that the race came down to the last lap, when Dustin Voss of Spirit of Pre TC hammered his way around to close out a 10:10.69 for his Saline Michigan HS teammates.

Saline led after the first two legs and had just a modest deficit after the third. Voss, however, took the lead before the final bell and used a terrific last lap to win by 0.57 over Liverpool, NY, running a PR 4:12.8. “I couldn’t let my team down,” he said. Although the winning time was one of the slowest ever, 9 schools still ran 10:17 or faster.

Neil Atzinger started off in 3:04.9, including another great last lap. “I saw the guy’s shadow behind me,” he said. “I had to pick it up and give my team a bigger lead.” When he handed off, Mt. Lebanon TC (PA), Warwick Valley (NY), Shenendehowa (NY) and Cumberland Valley (PA) were all close behind.

Then Saline’s Kevin Laidlaw laid it down to the tune of 49.7 on the second leg. “It’s my best split ever,” he said. “It’s what I’ve worked for all year, pretty much.” The sharp-eyed may have noticed that Laidlaw’s first 200 was awfully fast, but he said, “That’s what you’ve got to do, get out and hold on. I didn’t quite have the legs in the finish, but luckily, it was enough.”

Next was Saline’s potential weak link, quarter-miler Tim Russell moving up to the 2-lapper. “My goal was just to give it to Voss in racing distance,” he said, after the 2:03.2. “I just made sure that no one would put a big gap on me.”

Shenendehowa now led, with Liverpool in 2nd, but Voss was still plenty close. To his credit, the 9:08 3200 junior stayed patient. “I really wanted it; I was hungry,” he said. Of his hard push with 400 left, he added, “I’m not much of a kicker at the (very) end ... so I figure if I go early, I wouldn’t have to deal with it in the end.”

The time broke the school’s record by 15 seconds, the 10:25 coming in a runner-up effort at NIC. Liverpool was 2nd in 10:11.26, Cardinal O’Hara (PA) rallied for 3rd (10:13.05), and Mt. Lebanon edged Cumberland for 4th, 10:13.96 to 10:13.99.

Boys Steeple

A conservative early pace paid off for Albuquerque, NM’s Andres Urbina. Content to let David Holliday, the national 3k steeple leader, take the early pace, Urbina waited to pounce.

“I was pretty excited to go and I figured on the third lap – the third water jump – I’d make a move,” he said. “And I was right where I needed to be; I was five meters behind the guys the first two laps. So I made a strong move and I kept on moving for about a lap. And I didn’t feel anybody with me so I kept going the rest of the way.”

Win he did in 6:00.62, beating Ryan Wilson (6:03.71) of Wichita, KS; Miguel Reyes (6:04.38) of Haverstraw, NY; and Holliday (6:04.49). The steeple is not a New Mexico event, but Urbina had a handful of races under his belt since last year and was confident. “I was coming in here expecting to run a fast time because I knew the guys were fast,” he said. “You always go for the win; so I went for the win and I got it.”

“My coach did it in high school and college at UNM; he got me and one of my teammates into it,” Urbina added. “We were both pretty good; we were both ex-basketball players and pretty athletic. So we’d mess around with it; we jumped over fences and rocks; anything we could find. It’s a fun event; I like it.

“It’s a PR for me, but I can run faster,” he concluded.

Girls Steeple

After two years of setting class records, but not entering the winner’s circle, Grahamsville, NY junior Heather Iatauro achieved the latter in impressive fashion. Her 6:54.39 won by over 8 seconds.

Iatauro wasted no time moving ahead. “I took the lead right at first water barrier,” she said. “I probably could have gone out a little bit slower, but I just went for it.” She also admitted she was going for the junior AND national record, the 6:52.25 that Liz Gesel ran 2 years earlier. “I might do it again next week; we’ll see,” she said, referring to junior nationals.

Iatauro did run a 6:53 a few weeks earlier, but had not raced in the heat yet this year. But given it’s her third trip to Raleigh, she’d dealt with it before. Closest in her wake were Shauneen Garrahan (7:02.98) of Fairfax Station, VA, and Eric Demchko (7:04.73) of Nanuet, NY. “I’ve needed to attack my barriers better and I did them really, really well this time,” Iatauro concluded. It’s just my last lap ... from 400 to 300 to go, I didn’t run it very well.”