2019 Chesapeake Invitational

This is the first time since I've been back at DeMatha that we've gone to a meet that, to my knowledge, DeMatha cross country has never attended before.

There was one rather long stretch of concrete sidewalk the athletes had to run along on the way to the mile mark and on the way back in from the 2-mile mark. Otherwise, this was a very nice course with short grass, a brief stretch of wooded trail in the second mile, and not too much in the way of hills.

Overall, I'm very pleased with our boys today. There were some, by their standards, poor performances today in the varsity race. But there was also a lot to be very excited about from that race and from the JV race.

This is touted as a fast course, and it showed for many of our athletes with a number of them setting impressive PRs this week.

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), but not PR, in the cross country 5k.

Varsity

Here are the results for our Varsity A athletes (168 total entries in the race). The number in front of each name signifies their overall place in the Varsity race. In brackets are their first mile, second mile, and last 1.1 mile splits:

49 Jayden Keels (Fr.) - 18:23.5 [(1) 5:39, (2) 6:12, (3.1) 6:32] PR by 1 second

52 Thomas Parsons (Sr.) - 18:28.9 [(1) 5:39, (2) 6:09, (3.1) 6:41] SB by 28 seconds

60 Langston Stovall (So.) - 18:36.4 [(1) 5:41, (2) 6:18, (3.1) 6:37] PR by 32 seconds

74 Dawson Grogan (So.) - 19:00.9 [(1) 5:38, (2) 6:17, (3.1) 7:06]

97 James Hudson (Jr.) - 19:32.4 [(1) 5:38, (2) 6:34, (3.1) 7:20]

101 Ian Parsons (Fr.) - 19:34.5 [(1) 6:04, (2) 6:38, (3.1) 6:53] PR by 37 seconds

114 Julius Gamble (Jr.) - 19:48.5 [(1) 6:02, (2) 6:33, (3.1) 7:14] PR by 26 seconds

120 Hayward Smith-Cassidy (Sr.) - 19:59.9 [(1) 5:53, (2) 6:48, (3.1) 7:19]

132 Jaiden Mosley (Jr.) - 20:24.1 [(1) 6:03, (2) 6:48, (3.1) 7:22]

144 Tariq Lewis (So.) - 21:08.0 [(1) 6:02, (2) 6:58, (3.1) 8:08]

Today was not a great day for our varsity team, and there's a mixed bag that comes with that. On one hand, it can certainly mess with the confidence of some of our athletes, especially the inexperienced ones who aren't used to the ups and downs that come with any competitive sport or activity. On the other hand, we know that we are better than the showing we gave today and the bottom line is that this meet is inconsequential. The WCAC championship in four weeks is the meet that we will look back on after the season to gauge the success of the team.

And even on a rough day, we had several athletes set PRs. Langston not only set a big PR, but he ran by far the best and smartest race of his high school career so far. This race may not mean much in the grand scheme of things for our season, but I told him before the race how important it was for him, and he stepped up to the challenge and then some!

Jayden repeated as our team leader, but Thomas bounced back from last week, when he ran through a bit of a bug, and set a new season best time and didn't let Jayden pull too far away in the last mile.

Dawson struggled in the last mile and James was very disappointed after cramping up badly just after the mile mark. They both did a good job of pushing through but I know they'll be geared up in two weeks at Glory Days. With the two of them, we have at least five varsity runners who can legitimately pack-run, which is a huge advantage when nobody has to be holding back in order to do it.

Ian not only broke 20:00 for the first time, but in doing so he beat Thomas's best time as a freshman, set on a fairly fast (though maybe not quite as fast as today's) course up in Williamsport, Md. Congrats, also, to Julius for breaking 20 minutes for the first time in his career!

Hayward told me after the race he wants to do the parkrun next Saturday, which is a bye week for us. He was very unhappy with his performance and doesn't want to wait the two weeks to bounce back. I respect his drive and determination.

Team Results

1. Sherwood 67 points

2. Mt. Hebron 98 points

3. Arundel 102 points

...

10. Good Counsel 267 points

...

12. DeMatha 307 points

...

15. St. Mary's Ryken 462 points

...

18. Western Tech 546 points

After our 2nd place finish at Landon last week, I was hopeful for a top five finish this week. But the truth is, I never really know what to expect heading to meets like this one. I don't put a whole lot of focus into what other WCAC schools do, preferring to just focus on helping our athletes to improve, and I certainly don't care enough to look into what guys are running outside of the WCAC. So the 12th place finish doesn't bother me.

Everybody on the team knows I wanted for us to beat Good Counsel today. Losing to them sucks, but we still have our shot to beat them at the race that matters. I've told the guys that we're good enough to finish in the top 3 at WCACs this season. I still believe that. But Good Counsel isn't just going to hand it to us. Bishop O'Connell isn't going to just hand it to us. And you better believe that The Heights is looking at us after last week the same way we're looking at Good Counsel after today.

40 points looks like a lot, but there were 18 schools out there today. There are 11 at WCACs, which means that number would be much smaller than it was. We're still very much within range.

Junior Varsity

Here are the results for our junior varsity athletes (221 total entries in the race). The number in front of each name signifies their overall place in the JV race. In brackets are their first mile, second mile, and last 1.1 mile splits:

20 Christopher Toomer (Fr.) - 19:48.2 [(1) 6:21, (2) 6:45, (3.1) 6:42] PR by 1 minute 18 seconds

30 Michael Metz (Fr.) - 20:11.6 [(1) 6:09, (2) 6:46, (3.1) 7:17] PR by 13 seconds

42 Sam Cockrell (Fr.) - 20:30.4 [(1) 6:00, (2) 6:57, (3.1) 7:33] PR by 44 seconds

55 Desmond Holt (So.) - 20:40.0 [(1) 6:22, (2) 6:54, (3.1) 7:24] PR by 45 seconds

94 Ronald Rucker (So.) - 21:36.4 [(1) 6:22, (2) 7:21, (3.1) 7:53] PR by 52 seconds

99 Steven Camarano (Jr.) - 21:43.6 [(1) 6:07, (2) 7:36, (3.1) 8:01] SB by 14 seconds

103 Jaden Davis (Fr.) - 21:48.2 [(1) 6:41, (2) 7:25, (3.1) 7:42] PR by 1 minute 43 seconds

127 Michael Duarte (Fr.) - 22:23.7 [(1) 6:57, (2) 7:32, (3.1) 7:55] PR by 54 seconds

135 Dominic Williams-Dzirasa - 22:34.4 [(1) 6:43, (2) 7:38, (3.1) 8:14] PR by 30 seconds

151 Gavin Foran (Jr.) - 22:57.8 [(1) 6:35, (2) 8:11, (3.1) 8:12] SB by 1 minute 42 seconds

172 Jacob Robertson (So.) - 23:58.9 [(1) 7:17, (2) 8:12, (3.1) 8:30] PR by 16 seconds

173 Cameron Polk (Jr.) - 23:59.6 [(1) 7:16, (2) 8:12, (3.1) 8:32] SB by 6 seconds

175 Lucas Arzayus (Sr.) - 24:15.8 [(1) 7:10, (2) 8:09, (3.1) 8:57] SB by 13 seconds

180 Jon Kasner (So.) - 24:35.1 [(1) 7:20, (2) 8:27, (3.1) 8:48]*

182 Yaphet Negussie (Fr.) - 24:40.8 [(1) 7:52, (2) 8:02, (3.1) 8:47] PR by 1 minute 37 seconds

190 Georges Tadonki (Fr.) - 25:08.3 [(1) 7:21, (2) 8:51, (3.1) 8:56] PR by 3 minutes 1 second

202 Jackson McCormick (So.) - 27:22.0 [(1) 8:09, (2) 9:20, (3.1) 9:53] PR by 3 minutes 14 seconds

208 Ian Brown (So.) - 28:01.5 [(1) 8:10, (2) 9:20, (3.1) 10:32] PR by 2 minutes 1 second

209 Jaquada Moses (Fr.) - 28:48.3 [(1) 8:01, (2) 10:39, (3.1) 10:08]

210 Andrew Foreman (Fr.) - 28:49.2 [(1) 7:56, (2) 10:44, (3.1) 10:09]

I'll be writing all weekend if I go into as much detail as I could on all these performances. Suffice it to say that I am so proud of all 20 of our JV runners today!

Coach Mike talked to Christopher about getting out a little faster than he has and he ran great today. He didn't kill himself in the first mile and he found that he had the strength to not only finish but to skip 20-minutes all together, going straight from 21:06 last week to 19:48 this week. At Landon, he ran the first mile in 6:42. He took 21 seconds off that first mile today, came back just 24 seconds slower in the second mile (only Yaphet had a smaller difference from his first to second mile in either race today), and then negative split the last 1.1-mile leg of the race! That suggests he can still knock off a good chunk of time from today.

Like Chris, Jaden skipped an entire minute going from 23:30.6 last week into the 21s today.

Ronald and Dominic both earned their first PRs since last season. Great job, you guys!

I know Gavin is still frustrated to be so far off his freshman times, but he took a nice step today by knocking almost two minutes off his time from last week.

Jon gets the blue asterisk because this is his first official 5k (the course at Georgetown Prep, as far as I could determine, was off-distance, so day's race becomes his PR by default, thus the asterisk. If we count the open race at Woodward Relays, however, this would be a PR by 1 minute 43 seconds!

Yaphet followed Chris and Jaden's footsteps and skipped over the 25-minute time frame entirely, and George skipped the 26- and 27-minute ranges in their entireties!

A huge congratulations to both Jackson and Ian as they broke 30 minutes for the first time in their careers. Jackson did run 29:30 at the parkrun a couple weeks before we ran it as a team, but hadn't broken 30 minutes with the team, yet, so this was a huge milestone for him. Ian nearly broke 30 minutes last year at Landon but then ran nearly 3 minutes slower last week. He ended up taking almost exactly 5 minutes and 30 seconds off last week's time today, so I am absolutely thrilled for him.

I told the team early in the season, when we still had several athletes who needed to hit their qualifying times, that I was confident every single athlete on this team was capable of breaking 30 minutes. I'm very happy to be able to say that as of today, we officially have reached 100 percent success in meeting that goal!

Team Results

1. South River 59 points

2. Mr. Hebron 73 points

3. River Hill 100 points

...

9. DeMatha 217 points

...

11. Good Counsel 278 points

...

14. Queen Anne's County 409 points

Despite a few gaps in our five scorers, we managed to do enough to get into the top 10 in the JV race and we beat Good Counsel. When it comes to JV races, I just want to see strong individual performances from our guys, but any time we can beat a WCAC school makes those great performances a little extra sweet. Good job, team!

Final Thoughts/Quick Preview

In two weeks we will run at the Glory Days Grill Invitational in Virginia, at the site of our conference championship meet. I expect to see most of the other WCAC schools there as they will also want their athletes to see the course before championships. Obviously, we want to be competitive at that meet.

However, as in the past I intend to run every freshman in the freshman boys race, including those who would otherwise run on varsity. We only get to run 7 athletes in the varsity race, so every non-varsity, non-freshman will run in the JV race. For the freshmen who earned varsity spots for that meet today - Jayden Keels, Ian Parsons, and Christopher Toomer, who was our 7th fastest runner today - Glory Days will still count toward their earned varsity spots for the purpose of varsity letters. But I think it's valuable to give those athletes a chance to compete against their fellow freshmen. I am excited to see how we do in the team results for that race this year. As far as I can tell, the hype for how fast Chesapeake's course is may have been (slightly) overblown. I think the course at Bull Run Regional Park is even faster.

I will get meet info out soon, maybe even tomorrow despite us being two weeks out. We will also have an updated practice schedule for this week and I will send that out today (Saturday) to give everybody time to plan accordingly.

Remember, we have the parkrun as a tuneup the week before WCACs, but for all intents and purposes, we have just one race left before our championship. Performances at Glory Days will be the primary basis upon which I determine our varsity lineup for the championship meet, so let's get a couple good weeks of practice in and make sure we're taking care of our bodies so we can be ready to go on October 12!

"Happiness is different from pleasure. Happiness has something to do with struggling and enduring and accomplishing." - George Sheehan