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Don Mitchell Roosevelt Memorial
Stars Battle Wind To Electrify Crowd in Dayton
Fri.-Sat., May 4-5, 2007 Dayton OH
By SteveU
To earn an MVP in the Don Mitchell Roosevelt Memorial Invitational Friday and Saturday, you had to do your thing not once, not twice, but at least three times.
And do it well.
Knoxville West/Track Knoxville sr Jackie Coward had no problem meeting qualifications. She easily swept her specialties, the 100 and 300 hurdles, in (meet record?) times of 13.40 and 41.94. She added an anchor on the 4x200 relay (1:40.48) on top of that.
For the boys, it was a little tougher to decide, but after his 21.31 200 – albeit highly wind-aided – Glenville’s Kyle Jefferson had produced a weekend’s worth of efforts in the 200, 400, and relays that netted him the honor.
The best mark of the meet, though? That came Friday, when Cleveland Heights used uncommon depth to rip a US#1 7:42.15 4x800. The first day also saw the fast boys SMRs from Detroit Mumford and Middletown OH, the boys steeplechase meet record from Winton Woods’ Mike Perry, and a meet record PV from Temperance Bedford MI’s Logan Lynch.
Beyond that, the meet featured its usual strong sprint relays, though marks in most events were a little off because of inclement weather – especially Saturday afternoon when a front moved through that brought winds of more than 20 mph and light rain. The competitive thrills were there even when the great marks weren’t, such as when Sam Borchers slingshotted the field after the halfway mark of the boys 800, or when Jessica Beard held off Ramzee Fondren in the girls version of the same, or the tight finishes in the boys 100, 200, and 110H.
The excitement level was definitely cranked up the highest during Coward’s runs, Borchers’ surge, and the great team effort from Cleveland Heights.
Coward didn’t have a lot of competition really pushing her, but she still ran her second best legal time ever (and US#3 performance) in the 100H, 13.40 (the wind gauge had been taken down, but there was a slight headwind at the time). Then in the 300H, she was just 0.28 off her PR and US#1 with her 41.92. These came after morning prelim times of 13.63 and 42.33.
“In the short hurdles, there were a lot of small mechanical things that could have gone better, but it was pretty good,” Coward said. “The 300 hurdles was hard with that big wind on the backstretch.”
She added that her training is “going really well.” The previous week, when she hit her new PR of 13.27, which put her = #7 all-time, she “wasn’t trying to run some crazy time, but just executed pretty well and it happened. I had really wanted the faster times today.”
The craziest thing in the meet was the 800 and the way talented, but somewhat enigmatic Yellow Springs sr Sam Borchers handled the field. His, uh, rather unique racing schedule had him tripling at a home invitational the night before, where he ran a 1:54 relay leg, 1:55 winning open 800, and an easy 4:34 winning 1600. A pretty heavy load, even if none of them may have been all out.
Borchers was originally slated for the 1600, but switched to the 800. “I saw the fast guys listed in the 800. I mean, the mile was solid, but the 800 looked more tempting.”
The buzz was very high when a strong 800 field toed the line, a group which also included Cleveland Heights stud Jared Hall (anchor of the 4x8 squad) and Detroit Mumford’s Isaiah Ward. While Borchers obviously has wheels, he is relatively untested in the 800 … AND due to the late add, he started in the outside box of the oversized 16-runner field.
The stagger threw Borchers off, and he lingered with the other runners on the outside. By 400, when runners cut in, he was trailing the top eight or so seeds. For almost any other runner, it would have been a hopeless deficit to make up. But Borchers threw it into high gear and made jaws drop by sprinting past the entire top half of a GOOD field in the next 100 meters. It was as incredible an 100-meter stretch as you’ll ever see in an 800.
Entering the backstretch, with a ferocious headwind, he had taken the lead. He checked back at the havoc he had wrought and kept his pace to the homestretch. With the wind turning in his favor, he pushed again to increase his margin and crossed the line in 1:54.35, more than 3 seconds clear of Ward. The time overall wasn’t impressive, but given that the rest of the experienced field was all 3-5 seconds off their PRs in the windy conditions, it WAS impressive. And people just don’t run the way he did and win.
But the amazing thing was the way Borchers ate a good field alive with that surge at 400. Leave it to this guy to consider the wind his new best friend. “It was just what I needed,” he said. “I was not happy with where I was at 400. I figured as a distance runner, I would have enough for a surge and be able to hold on.”
Relay teams don’t usually run the way Cleveland Heights did, either. “I was hoping we would just break 7:50,” said Coach Claude Holland. “But the kids were thinking differently.”
Oh, they broke 7:50, but by a lot more than Coach Holland probably thought they would. Dontave Cowsette and Matthew Love made sure it would be a big night when they cranked out PRs of 1:54.6 and 1:54.7 on the first two legs. Sylvester Watts followed with 1:56.5 and anchor Jared Hall clocked a solid, but not to-his-potential 1:55.8. They won by more than 15 seconds.
“We haven’t tapered at all yet,” said Coach Holland. “We’ve definitely got room to improve.”
(more story/pics coming)
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Mitchell Roosevelt Memorial
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