by Marc Bloom
They came to Raleigh by the planeload, many helped by meet expense
allowances, and they came by bus and van, many making all-day trips,
to compete for national titles and stand up to the pressure, to
run the relays in pursuit of records, to make new friends and, for
some, to end their high school careers with a flourish.
They came to the adidas High School National Track & Field Championships,
which got under way on Friday evening at North Carolina State University
and conclude today. The event, under the auspices of the National
Scholastic Sports Foundation, a non-profit group started in 1990,
has grown to two events in one: a setting in which the elite teenage
athletes take their first strides toward Olympic glory, and one
in which a second echelon of performers, fueled by the opportunity
to mix with the best, are motivated to reach higher berths than
they thought possible.
They all had craved a spot in Raleigh: from Texas sprinter Kelli
Willie, whose versatility was reminiscent of Olympic great Michael
Johnson, to unknown racewalker Jasmine Brooks, who’d come
by van from the Maine woods “to compete against people I don’t
even know—and they’re all great.”
Brooks is a junior at Dirigo High in Peru, Maine. With two dads
driving, Brooks and five other Maine athletes traveled 18 hours
to Raleigh, arriving Thursday morning. On Friday, Brooks placed
fourth in the one-mile racewalk in 7:44.73. On Saturday, Brooks
and the Maine contingent piled back into their van for the 18-hour
trip home.
But before they departed, Brooks, breathing heavily after her race,
said, “I’m pumped up.” Raleigh was her Olympics.
Asked what was notable about Peru, a small town in interior Maine,
Brooks said, “Absolutely nothing.”
Not even a moose sighting?
“Oh, yeah, we have moose,” said Brooks.
In the strenuous grind of one lap after another, racewalkers and
distance runners have a certain kinship. Brooks had something in
else in common with one young distance runner in Raleigh, and it
was not just that he made his own long trip by van from upstate
New York. Josh McDougal is from the small town of Peru, in the vast
northern Adrirondacks near Canada. There’s not much going
on in that Peru either, said McDougal, a sophomore who’s home-schooled
by parents who are teachers.
McDougal, who has no team and trains in obscurity, had a coming
out party in Raleigh. It was his first big high school track meet.
He was allowed to compete because the adidas meet is a post-season
event open to all athletes who meet the qualifying standards. McDougal
earned his way in on May 25 with an 8:26 3,000 meters in an open
meet in Waltham, Mass. His time set a New York State record for
sophomores and was the equivalent of around a 9-flat two-mile.
And on Friday night, with storm clouds threatening but keeping their
distance, McDougal, who’d just turned 17, ran at the front
of the deep field. All the hitters were in there including the three
top finishers at last December’s Foot Locker cross-country
championship: winner Tim Moore of Michigan, runnerup Bobby Lockhart
of Virginia, and third-placer Chris Solinsky of Wisconsin, whose
8:48 3200 in April led the nation.
After a slow 4:36 first mile, the pace grew faster and McDougal
fell back. Lockhart made the big move with 250 to go and held on
for the victory in 8:59.19. McDougal was far back in 12th in 9:25.57.
He was mad at himself but recognized that he’d learned a lot
as a novice in the big time and vowed to come back.
High jumper Shaunte Howard of California expresed a similar sentiment
in victory a year ago. A Georgia Tech bound senior at North High
in Riverside, Howard returned to Raleigh even though she felt rusty
from coaching herself in recent weeks. She’d come back not
only for another gold medal. “The competition is intense but
the girls are so friendly,” said Howard after repeating as
champion in a meet record 6’1 ½”, best in the
nation. “I really love that.”
You can’t say there’s a love fest in the boys’
100 meters. Too much attitude. Show one little weakness and your
opposition will eat you up. Add that the favorites were all Texans--who
else seems to own the sprints?—and you have the pressure of
an Olympic final. No problem for Kelly Willie of Sterling High in
Houston, who said, “You just do it. You get your mind situated.”
And Willie wasn’t even a true 100 man. He was the nation’s
top 400 runner in 45.52. But he captured the 100 in 10.39 over the
defending champ, Brendan Christian, a long stride back in 10.50.
It was Willie’s last high school race, a “bittersweet”
juncture, he said, as he prepared to move on to “greater things”
in college at Louisiana State.
Eric Fleming, an 800 runner from Downingtown, Pennsylvania, was
inching his way toward greatness. After winning a secondary section
of the two-mile in a personal best 9:15.89, the Bishop Shanahan
junior still needed to get comfortable in his runner’s skin.
A soccer player in the fall, Fleming resisted the idea of running
full-out in cross-country next season, the crucial base for aspiring
distance runners.
After his “victory,” Fleming thought that maybe he’d
do soccer and cross-country in the fall. Injuries are made from
less. Absorbing the atmosphere at the track, Fleming said, “This
is my first nationals and I know there’s no slacking off.”
Fleming said he planned to train over the summer. He also said
he wanted to come back to Raleigh next year as a championship contender.
Now if the young man can only get his fall priorities in order…
No question about the fall for Maggie Infeld, an Ohio junior at
Beaumont High in the Cleveland area. Second in her state cross-country
race last fall, Infeld developed into the state 1600 titlist in
a nationally-ranked 4:51 earlier this month. But in Raleigh she
was something of an understudy. Instead of venturing into the big
individual races, Infeld stuck to the relays. Perfect preliminary
work for next year. And she started off Friday with a well-paced,
come-from-behind 800 anchor on her team’s victorious sprint
medley team.
“The competition is amazing,” she said after outrunning
her opposition from St. Mary’s of California and Willingboro
of New Jersey.
For a group of 48 New York City athletes who’d made the 10-hour
trip together by bus, the competition was all they’d hoped
it would be, but they found a broader fulfillment. For most in the
group, it was their first meet in a setting as lush as that surrounding
Paul Derr Track at North Carolina State. Or, as a New York coach
who came with the group, Bobby Orazem, said, “It was the first
time they saw trees at a track meet.”
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