I never would have thought an April could be running
paradise without the Boston Marathon, but it was outstanding. Wyatt managed a couple of 3200s under 11:10,
including a wonderful effort at Shawnee Mission West where he ran 11 flat. He also ran a strong 5:04 at ODAC on the 6th. I ran a post-microfracture debut 5k in 17:54 on
April 21 that was a wonderful surprise since I would not have guessed that I
could manage a sub-18 race off only a month of running. The biggest surprise of all last month,
however, was the emergence of boy number 2, Josiah, as a middle distance
runner. He has run the 800 and the 1600
for Frontier Trail Middle School in every meet this spring and, oddly, the 75m
hurdles. This post, however, is not
about this past, wonderful month of running, as good as it has been. This post is about one of the gutsiest, most
fearless races I’ve ever seen. This post
is about the Olathe Middle School (7th Grade) City 800m championship
race that happened on May 3
.
Honestly, I’ve never before thought of Josiah as a distance
runner. For one thing, he is my
basketball boy, so I think of that as his primary sport. For another thing, when the kids were littler
he was always the first one to wear out.
When we hiked in the mountains, for example, we would barely get 200
yards from the car when he would need to sit down and rest and start asking, “Are
we almost done?” I thought then that he
might lack the innate mental toughness needed to be a good distance
runner. Boys change, however, and it
turns out I was wrong!
He wasn’t even going to run track this spring, but
fortunately his mother had the good idea to conspire with Mr. Blasi, the head
track coach. Josiah wouldn’t listen to
her encouragement to run track, but he did listen to Mr. Blasi and decided to
go out. At the start of the season he
was the number 2 or 3 distance runner on the FTMS team, but he immediately
started improving: 6:08, 6:01, 5:51, 5:45,
5:39 in the mile, and similar improvements in the 800 to get down to 2:34. Going into the City Meet this week he was
well positioned to do okay against the best runners from all 9 schools in
Olathe.
I took the afternoon off Thursday so I could see him run all
of his events, including the hurdles. In
the previous meet he finished second in the hurdles and complained that the wet
bottoms of his shoes slipped coming out of the blocks and slowed him down, so I
took my spikes down from their perch up high in the closet to see if they would
fit him. They did. And at City, then, he nailed an excellent hurdle
run, taking 2nd place in his best time of the year.
In the mile (1600m) there was stiff, stiff competition in
the 7th grade this year in Olathe.
He ran a very commendable race, making a nice surge in the third lap to
move from 8th to 6th, burying the two guys he left
behind. He finished in a nice personal
record 5:36, ten or more seconds ahead of 7th place but also ten or
so seconds behind 5th. The
winner ran 5:14, and as good as Josiah got this year and as much as he
improved, it definitely would have been expecting way too much to think that he
would be competitive against kids going under 5:20. He will get there against those kids if he
wants to – I know he will – just not this year.
But still, he ran a nice 3-second PR against a really tough field. I was really proud of his mile. But then came the 800.
Had I just finished a mile in 6th place 20+
seconds behind the winner there is almost no way I would have run the 800 –
against almost all the same runners – the way Josiah ran the 800. Seeded 7th in the race, he was
apparently completely unimpressed and unintimidated by the competition he just
faced 75 minutes earlier. At the gun he
took off like he was shot out of a bow, and in the first 200 opened up at least
10m of lead over the second place runner.
By the time he came through the quarter he was still in the lead with a
wicked fast 68.
 |
| Leading at 400 |
Other runners were
starting to close on him between 500 and 600, but I just had a fleeting thought
that just maybe he might be able to actually hold it up. Alas, no.
Mr. Lactic Acid jumped on him hard at 600, as he often does to runners
who over-reach in that opening quarter of a half-mile, and Josiah’s opponents
started going around him. Coming
through 600 and around the final turn he dropped to 2nd, then 3rd,
then 4th, 5th….. 6th. Ahh, he had tried so hard. He had given it everything he had, I
figured. He had risked it all against
some really good competition, and he could hold his head high, even with
another 6th place finish. But
then with 100 meters to go something happened.
That boy of mine – the one who used to frustrate me when he was little because
he didn’t seem to have toughness or competitive fire – did something
competitive, something tough, something especially fiery. He decided he was not going to finish 6th,
and he threw down a final, ferocious kick, and clawed his way back to 3rd. As he went by those three boys they all tried
to respond, they tried to answer, but he continued to answer back, refusing to
give up and refusing to be denied his spot on the podium, and he finished the 3rd
best 800m 7th grader in Olathe in a massive personal record time of
2:26.9.
 |
| Go Jaguars -- Josiah scores well-earned points in the 800 |
I wonder if someday Josiah and I will look back on this little 7th grade track season as a watershed. This year he learned he can run distance events. He learned that he can be successful and win races (he won several). I learned that he can be very tough. I learned that he can be very competitive and absolutely full of fire. May 3, 2012. Write it down.
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