First to the Finish Recap

I often feel overwhelmed after cross country meets there is so much to take in and process. Today 37 guys laid it out there on the course and truly raced for the first time all season. I took most of the bus ride back from Peoria combing over the results to get a better picture of what our day looked like for the Phoenix. Every meet you walk away with some great performances as well as guys who didn't perform to their best with opportunities to learn from their races. Today was no different.
Our varsity guys were frustrated last week that they didn't get the chance to race, our meet was cancelled due to lightning. They have had a great summer and want to make the most of this year as a team, and wanted to get that started to see what kind of shape they are truly in. Our only race environment thus far was a glorified tempo effort at our Preseason Conference meet 2 and half weeks ago. All that to say they were chomping at the bit to get rolling at Detweiller today. As a team the guys wanted to establish a good position through the first turn, and they did that well. The lead pack came around the big evergreen and there were our top 5 all within 7-10 seconds of the lead. That group quickly turned into 1-3-1. John Chomiak pressed towards the front putting himself in the high teens low twenties for the first mile (4:49). While Demetri, Noah, and Kyle were a few seconds back working as a strong unit. It was a sight to see as we have been working as a group for workouts for the past few months but they now finally had a chance to do that in a race. Mark Harris was about 5 seconds back of the trio. Then came rolling along Mikey T and Belavich, followed closely by Nino, and JD and Jermoo racing hard. Things start to open up a little in the back loop as our group of three closed on John and quickly became a pack of four. As the guys attacked the final mile the group spread out slightly with Demetri leading the charge. Demetri was the top finisher in (#2 in school history) 15:18 followed closely by Noah (#3 all time) in 15:22. Soccer player turned cross country stud Kyle Bechtold finished his first actual race in 15:30 as our number 4. For John it was not his day, finishing 4th on the team in 15:45. He was followed in by Mark in 15:53. A top 5 average of 15:33. To put that in context, last year at state we averaged 15:52.

Here is a look at the last three years of First to the Finish for Top 7 finishers for LWN:
2013:
16:00 John Chomiak
16:29 Ian Mayster
16:36 Noah Healy
16:37 Mark Harris
16:46 Nick Niendorf
17:22 Rob Harrington
18:07 Jack Pursel

2014:
15:15 John Chomiak
15:51 Noah Healy
16:05 Mark Harris
16:23 Nick Niendorf
16:28 Mike Trost
16:39 Demetri Panici
16:47 Ryan Belavich

2015:
15:18 Demetri Panici
15:22 Noah Healy
15:30 Kyle Bechtold
15:45 John Chomiak
15:53 Mark Harris
16:17 Ryan Belavich
16:17 Mike Trost

Our 6-10 finished the day on a high note as well. Trost and Belavich finished shoulder to shoulder in 16:17. An life-time PR for Belavich and a great sign for Trost in his 5th week of running off a broken ankle this summer. Nino, Stajkowski, and Donovan all ran life-time PRs as well (all three also ran 2 mile PRs in the process). The varsity race had some great takeaways.
The open race was a mass of humanity, 700+ runners toeing the line. The Phoenix men finished the day strong for us. Joe Schuetz shook off the funk from the Preseason meet to be our top finisher in 16:57 (life-time PR), Joe got out aggressive and ran a strong 1st and 3rd mile. The sky will be the limit for Joe as he closes the gap on the top group. Our second training group has been, in a lot of ways the heartbeat of the team this season. It's made up of mostly sophomores and juniors who have worked their tails off this summer to come into the season in great shape, and it paid off today big time with some great performances. Matt Jung was our second man in finishing in 17:19 (life-time PR). Wesner and Curtin were our next crew in, finishing in 17:32. Wesner ran a mile, 2 mile and 3 mile PR en route! Closing hard on those two was Iozzo (17:33). HamBoy was next in clocking his first sub 18 (17:55). We had three enter the sub 19 club for the first time (Patel, Ryan Schuetz, and Kenny Belavich). And three who cracked 20 for the first time, Purcell, Fitzgerald and Magee. We had a few strong packs of guys who were able to push each other to great times early in the year. Kilpatrick, White, Witkowski, and McGuire all finished within 20 seconds of each other. Newbie to the team Zambrano really turned on the jets the last mile to run a great first race as a Phoenix 21:39. There was another pack of black and gold that all finished between 22:06 and 22:35 (Ketchen, Gummy, Sly, and Gale). Styrsky was one of three runners who was making their XC debut today and he ran a tough gutsy race, 23:52. Milosovic was next in at 25:44. The next three finishers all ran PRs of over 4 minutes (Major, Fabian, and Esparza). Our final time finisher of the day was Sean Farmer. Sean was able to break 30:00 for the first time, with a great tactical race and an incredible last mile to run 29:19.

It was a great day to get that first true race experience under our belts. A step in the process, the goal for some is to be at their best at conference, for others its state. Whatever that goal let's make sure we keep doing this the right way and encourage one another to represent LWN in the best possible way.