NCAA Div II Champ - Celedonio Rodriguez

Adams State Division II National Champ

On the shelf in the front room sits the bottle of water given to me in the press box after Montgomery HS of Santa Rosa Sara Bei's senior race win at the State Track Meet over 3200m in Sacramento. Sara delivered it, with the names of the top girls in recent history from that Santa Rosa area - Julia Stamps, Trina Cox, Jenny Aldridge, and herself. Over a period of about a half a dozen years, I had kept asking the question, "Is it the water? (that makes all those good runners?)" I think Sara had finally had enough, and as a thanks for support during her and others' running delivered the stuff in person! Why from one area had so many super runners come, with a fine back-up crew right behind? There have certainly been a number of fine male runners also from that area, with another name to add right to the top of the list after his collegiate accomplishments his senior Collegiate season at Adams State College in Alamosa, Colorado this Fall. Elsie Allen is the newest of the schools built in the Santa Rosa area, with the district giving great care to the medium sizing in entrollment of high school institutions there, with former State CIF Commissioner, Jack Hayes, a Superintendent there, once commenting that was an intention of folks in the area. With populations booming, I have no idea where enrollments are now, but the high schools in Santa Rosa all appeared to be of a sane size a few years back (as I view where I work with 3500 students out at one lunch!).

Anyway, who is this latest individual we have to add to the glorious distance running history of that area? He had a fine prep career at Elsie Allen HS, even made it to the Foot Locker Nationals his senior year, in a bit of an upset performance to take fourth place at the Regionals in 1998. We even lost track of him a couple of years after high school, as he matured at the longer college distances, with our increased collegiate coverage this Fall bringing the thought to mind, "now where have we heard that name before?" Ah, that is where Celedonio Rodroiguez, the 1998-99 Elsie Allen HS prep star, ended up at, Adams State. Rodriguez had a fine prep career and showed some real flashes of brilliance, but his progression to National Championshp status (he did win the 2003 NCAA Divison II CC Championship individually by 14 seconds in leading his team to the title) is another inspirational one from athletes from the area of Santa Rosa just north of San Francisco.

Celedonio was about a 9:43 3200 runner as a junior at Elsie Allen High School. He had a fine senior year, and was second to Steve Laurie from Maria Carrillo in NCS Division III action his 1998 senior cross country season. Celedonio was coached by Isaac Benton that year, with Isaac an interesting story. I had dinner with Isaac and Celedonio at Bill Cockerham's house in Fresno that state meet year in Cross Country, with Bill having recruited Isaac to Fresno Pacific, where he became a 1:53.97 800m runner. Interestingly, the recruiting story was a "different strokes" one, as Isaac was working at the San Francisco International Airport when Bill's team came through, they started a conversation, and things eventually ended up with Isaac at Fresno Pacific and ending up among the top 800 runners in the NAIA school's history. We had dinner with Bill and his wife Judy and the mild-mannered Celedonio went out the next day to win the State Div III title at 15:25, an impressive win, but not a performance that would lend one to believe he could qualify for the Foot Locker Nationals the next week, the first year that competition had been moved down south to Mt. SAC. Surprisingly, Rodriguez was fourth in that 1998 Foot Locker West Regional behind Josh Rohatinsky of Utah, with the race qualifying him for the National competition, moved that year from San Diego to Florida. Celedonio was a fine 18th in Florida at 16:12, with Jorge Torres of Illinois, eventually a University of Colorado star, the race winner at 15:16. That spring's track season (1999) Celedonio was runner-up in the NCS 3200 at 9:23.90, and was 19th at the State Track Meet at 9:25.15. Super running, but not of a National Champion status - that took some work in college.

With being in the midst of trying to keep track of the local preps over the next couple of years, we did lose track of Rodriguez, figuring he was another of the talented folks who for one reason or another dropped off to the side of the running wars. As we started a bit more collegiate running coverage this year and looked at rankings and team membership, there he was leading the Adams State #1 Ranked NCAA Division II team, hopefully towards a national title. It turns out he did place 5th last year in the Div II Cross Country Nationals, has run a 3:53 1500m on the track and 29:12 for 10,000 there, with an eight place finish in last year's NCAA Div II Nationals outdoors Track at that distance. He obviously cranked it up this Fall, with a charge leading a California based team (amazingly Adams State had four Californians among its top five scorers at the National Div II Collegiate CC Meet) to the team title. Matt Levassiur (Katella HS) 8th, Mohamad Aden (Kearney HS/Mesa JC) 9th, and Enrique Guerrero (Escondido/Mesa JC) 14th formed the core of the Adams Champs, with Rodriguez out in front with a fourteen second individual victory in leading the squad. Amazing! Adams State has a great tradition in running, with famed Coach Joe Vigil establishing a tradition before he left a few seasons back that has obviously continued. Up until 1999 the program had won 12 National Men's titles, and nine in a row, with the 2003 Championship run the first since that 1999 win. The Women's program also won the 2003 national title.

Small world, and neat to see determined people sticking it with under some good direction and achieving great things. There was some commercial a few years back that talked about "the Colorado water," so maybe it's another one of those 'water' stories. Super young man, great to hear of his successes that we shared in early, and best of luck to him in the future - the latest great out of Santa Rosa - Celedonio Rodriguez (Elsie Allen HS/Adams State College)

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