2018 WCAC Championship

Good evening, all.

Thank you to everyone who has reached out via email or text after today's meet to express concern for my well-being. I was yelling to Dawson as he came around toward the finish and, without warning, I became very lightheaded with a throbbing pain in my temples. It could be a lack of hydration and food (though, to be fair, I never eat or drink much until I get home on race days), or any number of things.

I'll get right to things.

As always, in blue, I have noted all athletes who set a new PR (personal record) in the cross country 5k (3.1 mile) at the meet. Additionally, in red, I have noted all athletes who set a new SB (season best) in the cross country 5k.

Freshman

Here are the results for our freshmen athletes (54 total entries in the race). The number in front of each name signifies their overall place in the freshman race. In brackets are their first mile, second mile, and last 1.1 mile splits:

39 Ronald Rucker - 23:55 [(1) 6:48, (2) 8:57, (3.1) 8:10]

44 Sean Leonard - 25:13 [(1) 8:07, (2) 8:33, (3.1) 8:33]

48 Haroon Zaid - 25:52 [(1) 7:57, (2) 8:43, (3.1) 9:12]

50 Jacob Robertson - 25:54 [(1) 8:00, (2) 8:56, (3.1) 8:58] PR by 34 seconds

54 Ian Brown - 32:41 [(1) 9:36, (2) 11:27, (3.1) 11:38]

Under tough course conditions, Jacob did a fantastic job to PR. Of our other four athletes in this race, Haroon was the closest to his PR, less than 20 seconds away.

Team Results

1. St. John's 39 points

2. O'Connell 53 points

3. Good Counsel 64 points

4. Gonzaga 72 points

5. Ireton 134 points

6. The Heights 142 points

7. DeMatha 199 points

Inc. Bishop McNamara (1 finisher)

Inc. Paul VI (2 finishers)

Tariq, unfortunately, injured his ankle this week and was unable to run today. If he, Dawson, and Langston had run in the freshman race today, we would have placed 5th and been less than 40 points behind Gonzaga. Dawson would have finished 3rd in the freshman race today. As it stood, he was the 7th fastest freshman in any race today. While this result, on paper, may be discouraging, we have a lot of talent in this year's freshman class.

Varsity B

Here are the results for our Varsity B athletes (106 total entries in the race). The number in front of each name signifies their overall place in the Varsity B race. In brackets are their first mile, second mile, and last 1.1 mile splits:

25 Manuel Legaspi (Sr.) - 20:38 [(1) 6:24, (2) 7:06, (3.1) 7:08] SB by 39 seconds

42 Gavin Foran (So.) - 21:03 [(1) 6:38, (2) 7:26, (3.1) 6:59] SB by 40 seconds

57 Julius Haynes (Jr.) - 22:09 [(1) 6:52, (2) 7:58, (3.1) 7:19] PR by 44 seconds

60 Julius Gamble (So.) - 22:15 [(1) 7:00, (2) 7:40, (3.1) 7:35] PR by 3 seconds

70 Westley Douglas (Sr.) - 22:58 [(1) 7:12, (2) 7:55, (3.1) 7:51]

73 London Bailey (Jr.) - 23:11 [(1) 7:30, (2) 7:58, (3.1) 7:43]

75 Domenic Williams-Dzirasa (Jr.) - 23:14 [(1) 7:29, (2) 7:59, (3.1) 7:46]

76 Lucas Arzayus (Jr.) - 23:14 [(1) 7:35, (2) 7:52, (3.1) 7:47] PR by 30 seconds

81 Cameron Polk (So.) - 23:42 [(1) 7:38, (2) 8:13, (3.1) 7:51] SB by 1 second

89 Caleb Ghatt (Jr.) - 24:39 [(1) 7:17, (2) 8:30, (3.1) 8:52]

91 Bodior Elliott (Jr.) - 25:26 [(1) 7:44, (2) 8:25, (3.1) 9:17] SB by 38 seconds

92 Mathias Roy (Jr.) - 25:38 [(1) 7:50, (2) 8:50, (3.1) 8:58]

93 Keme Gbemiye-Etta (Sr.) - 25:58 [(1) 7:57, (2) 9:27, (3.1) 8:34]

95 Christopher Lamb (So.) - 26:37 [(1) 7:52, (2) 9:32, (3.1) 9:13]

101 Ryan Kasner (So.) - 28:25 [(1) 8:51, (2) 9:44, (3.1) 9:50] PR by 48 seconds

102 Garett Joldersma (So.) - 28:36 [(1) 9:09, (2) 9:50, (3.1) 9:37] PR by 36 seconds

Manuel wound up as our 7th fastest finisher today. While he did not run on varsity today, that will automatically earn him a varsity letter at the end-of-year banquet. While he did finish 27 seconds off the PR he set at this course last year, this was a great finish to Manuel's high school cross country career.

Congrats to all of our athletes who set new personal bests. Considering last year we had only three athletes who did not PR at this course, it is safe to say that the conditions made this course significantly slower. Despite that, Lucas's 30-second PR comes off the 23:44 he ran on this course last year in much better conditions. Great job to Lucas for not allowing the conditions to psych him out. I can only imagine how much more time he would have dropped if the course hadn't been so sloppy.

Ryan and Garett also made great jumps to notch their first sub-29 performances. Every single one of our boys kept each of their mile splits (and their final 1.1-mile cumulative splits) under 10 minutes, a first for our JV athletes this season!

Team Results

1. St. John's 15 points (perfect score)

2. Gonzaga 64 points (6th finisher: 21st place)

3. O'Connell 64 points (6th finisher: 23rd place)

4. Good Counsel 86 points

5. Ireton 128 points

6. DeMatha 184 points

7. Paul VI 216 points

Inc. St. Mary's Ryken (1 finisher)

Inc. The Heights (4 finishers)

I'd just like to point out the virtual tie for 2nd in this race as an opportunity to make sure our younger athletes understand one of the scoring quirks in cross country. When the combined scores of two teams' top 5 athletes comes out to a tie, the team with the faster 6th man gets the advantage.

One thing that struck me as I was counting heads on the line for this race was the fact that we had 16 athletes on the line. We were missing a few guys from this race today, but two years ago we had just 15 athletes on the roster in total (only 3 athletes ran in the Varsity B race that year).

Varsity A

Here are the results for our Varsity A athletes (71 total entries in the race). The number in front of each name signifies their overall place in the Varsity A race. In brackets are their first mile, second mile, and last 1.1 mile splits:

31 Dawson Grogan (Fr.) - 18:25 [(1) 5:41, (2) 6:20, (3.1) 6:24] PR by 1 minute 43 seconds

44 Thomas Parsons (Jr.) - 19:10 [(1) 5:52, (2) 6:31, (3.1) 6:47] SB by 23 seconds

46 James Hudson (So.) - 19:13 [(1) 6:08, (2) 6:35, (3.1) 6:30] PR by 15 seconds

53 Hayward Smith-Cassidy (Jr.) - 19:48 [(1) 6:04, (2) 6:54, (3.1) 6:50] PR by 6 seconds

55 Jaiden Mosley (So.) - 19:53 [(1) 6:20, (2) 6:46, (3.1) 6:47]

56 Langston Stovall (Fr.) - 19:53 [(1) 6:19, (2) 6:47, (3.1) 6:47] PR by 14 seconds

63 Steven Camarano (So.) - 21:05 [(1) 6:21, (2) 7:22, (3.1) 7:22]

All of our varsity athletes ran very similar races in that they each ran their 2nd mile half a minute or more slower than their first but then ran very similar splits over their final 1.1 miles as they did in their second miles.

Dawson responded very well to the late-season rest. Not only did he PR by a huge margin, he beat his 3-mile time from the Seahawk Invitational, our first meet of the season and the only other meet in which he was our fastest finisher.

Both James and Hayward ran their first PRs of the season. Their previous PRs were at last year's WCAC Championship.

James, Jaiden, and Thomas have all been sick within the last 10 days. In fact, Thomas was on medication for his race and Jaiden's body may not have fully recovered from being sick on Tuesday. James, it seems, may have had just enough time this week to get past his stomach bug because he ran great today.

Langston broke 20 for the first time in his career (not including the 2.95-mile course we ran here three weeks ago), so a big congratulations to him!

Team Results

1. Gonzaga 34 points

2. St. John's 49 points

3. O'Connell 80 points

4. Good Counsel 113 points

5. The Heights 139 points

6. Ireton 195 points

7. Paul VI 206 points

8. St. Mary's Ryken 224 points

9. DeMatha 229 points

10. Carroll 255 points

Inc. McNamara (3 finishers)

As far as I know, we fielded incomplete teams in 2001 and in 2002. Other than those two years, going back to 2000 (before which I don't have any data on WCAC or WMAC results), we have never finished as low as 9th at this meet. Our highest score since 2000 came in 2000 when we scored 190 points.

I want to be very clear. Our team today is the deepest team DeMatha cross country has ever fielded. But if you review the complete results from this race, you will see just how important it is to have athletes at the front of the pack. You can have seven talented athletes running together in the middle of the race and it wouldn't be enough; having only one athlete in the front half of the race as we did today certainly wasn't.

Final Thoughts

We ran on a very difficult course today. The overall winner of the Varsity A race, Max Greczyn of O'Connell, won this same race on this same course a year ago as a junior. He ran 2 seconds slower today than he did last year. The second place finisher, Gavin McElhennon of Gonzaga, was the second place finisher last year as a sophomore. He ran 12 seconds slower today than he did last year. Today's third place finisher, Cullen Capuano of Gonzaga, was the third place finisher last year as a sophomore. He ran 18 seconds faster today than he did last year. Today's fourth place finisher, Liam de Beaufort of St. John's, was the fourth place finisher last year as a junior. He ran 27 seconds faster today than he did last year.

Beyond the interesting fact that our top four today was an exact copy from last year, the paragraph above shows that results were varied in comparing today's course to last year's; but those who ran faster seemed to improve by larger margins than the margins by which those who ran slower declined. This suggests to me that, for those who ran slower this year than last year, it was primarily a mental block - a lack of confidence that this course could still be fast under the conditions.

I don't know if that was the case for our athletes. I know several of our freshmen and Varsity B athletes were hung up on the weather and the puddles and the mud. Our varsity athletes didn't seem to be too concerned about it, or at the very least they were not as vocal as some of our less experienced athletes.

I will be in touch concerning the cross country banquet. I'll be making some announcements at the banquet regarding changes for next year.

Additionally, all athletes need to return their uniforms to me. Those are provided by the school for the season but they are expensive. Athletes should make sure they hand it to me. Please do not just leave it outside of my office door. I have a list of what size uniform each athlete has (as well as whether it is a varsity or JV uniform). For any uniform(s) not returned, the school will charge $60 for JV uniforms or $120 for varsity uniforms.

Those uniforms need to be turned in to me no later than November 9. Two weeks should be more than enough time for those of you who are "chronic forgetters;" unless you procrastinate and then forget, in which case there may just be no hope for you.

"Things turn out the best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out." - John Wooden