Although it had rained quite a bit the night before, and we ran into a little drizzle on the way down Saturday morning, we were hoping for pretty good weather at the Richard Spring Memorial Invite. We got the camp set up, passed out the race numbers and the team set about getting themselves ready to race. The temperature was great for racing and the cloud cover kept things from heating up. The course was in good shape in spite of the rain.
There had been a big buildup this week, with Tony Jones at MileSplit IL calling it "Goliath vs. Goliath" and Mike Newman at DyeStatIL writing that this was "One of the most anticipated team races that we will see before the state meet in November."
As the number one rated team in the state of Illinois (and number 2 in the USA), we know that the Eagles have a target on their backs. Every team would like to knock off number one. And with teams like #3 Neuqua Valley, #5 York, #6 Lake Zurich, #7 Maine South, #8 Oak Park-River Forest, #18 Loyola Academy, #19 St. Charles East, #22 Stevenson and 2A: #1 Mahomet-Seymour, there were many teams lining up to take their best shot.
Coach O'Malley had made the decision to hold Chris Torpy out of this competition, so we asked our Varsity squad to step up their game this week. Additionally, one of our runners, Paul Sieczkowski, had a scary medical emergency right before the race started and ended up in the ambulance. Fortunately, he's fine and back to running in practice and will be ready to race at our next meet. Paul is as tough as they come.
In the meantime, our remaining 9 varsity runners squeezed in to box number 42. At the gun, they got out well and hit the first turn in very good shape. They had learned their lesson from last year's State Meet and went out aggressively from the start.
The leaders, including Jon Davis, Matt Pereira, Connor Horn & Irwin Loud, hit the mile mark at about 4:39. Surprisingly, the first Sandburg runner was sophomore Dylan Jacobs, right behind them at 4:40. Dylan was followed by Max Lehnhardt, Sean Torpy, Martin Skucas, Tom Brennan, David Gleisner, Brandon Lukas and Dan Laskero - with everyone passing thru at 4:46 or better. The majority of Neuqua Valley's pack was together at about 4:52 for the first mile.
By the time they came out of the North Loop and crossed the 2 mile mark, it was clear that the Sandburg boys were solidly in the lead. Now it was time to finish the job.
Class A stud, Jon Davis pulled away for the win in 14:10, with Irwin Loud of OPRF in second at 14:20. Sean Torpy held on for third place in a big PR of 14:27 (good for 3rd on the All-Time Sandburg list behind Lukas Verzbicas and Tom Graves). It was great to see Sean prove that he can run with the top dogs - giving us a nice low scorer.
Even more impressive was the race of Dylan Jacobs. Coming in with a Detweiller PR of 16:04 (at PND as a freshman), Dylan had progressed very nicely during the track season and thru the beginning of 2015 cross country. Even so, his 14:36 (7th place finish) had to open some eyes around the state of Illinois. This kid is fearless and is only going to get better as he matures. He now sits at number 6 All-Time in Sandburg history.
Next up for Sandburg was Max Lehnhardt in 8th place at 14:44. Max has been the most consistent Varsity runner so far this year and this was a 16-second PR for him at Detweiller. He now ranks as number 8 All-Time at Sandburg.
Tom Brennan crossed in 16th place with a time of 14:57 and Martin Skucas was our 5th runner under 15:00, finishing 18th in 14:59. Martin's time places him at 21st All-Time for Sandburg.
Showing off our depth, Dan Laskero ran 15:02, good for 20th place (and 23rd All-Time Sandburg), Brandon Lukas finished in 15:03 (23rd place and 25th All-Time for Sandburg) and David Gleisner's 28th place finish in 15:07 places him in 30th All-Time.
Anthony LiFonti made it 8 PR's out of 9 Sandburg runners with a solid time of 15:48.
Neuqua Valley made a great run at it over the last mile (and finished with 7 runners under 15:09), but in the end the Eagles won 51 to 81. York finished 3rd with 153, followed by Mahomet-Seymour (178) and Oak Park - River Forest (186).
The overall 5-man time for Sandburg was 73:45.2 - our best mark in history. This breaks our previous best of 74:52 set by Brennan, Burzinski, C. Torpy, S. Torpy & Skucas at last year's State meet by over a minute. Only 5 teams have ever run faster than 73:45 at the State meet since 1971 - York 4 times and Deerfield once (here's the list).
It was a very satisfying victory for the Varsity Eagles, but they're not ready to rest on their laurels. This was just another step to "Building Victory". The guys are well aware that Neuqua Valley, Lyons Township, Hinsdale Central, York, Lake Zurich and others will be re-doubling their efforts to take down the Eagles. There is a lot of training and racing to be done between now and November 7th.
Ryan Duffy was next in 16:58 (111th place). Patrick Morris finished at 17:30 (152nd) and was followed by our three other freshmen - Peter Bukuri (18:04), John Cunningham (18:11) and Sam Lane (19:24).
Overall, our frosh-soph squad finished in 15th place with 455 points. We had some PR's today and got some experience for some of the freshmen runners, but we're going to have to put in some work to move this group up as they move forward.
John Wagner brought home 20th place in 16:41 and Lou Cavalier was our 7th man and placed 28th in 16:52.
It's a nice feeling to win a big invitational like PND. But certainly, this is only a step for the team, just one in a series on our way to much bigger goals. Our Varsity had felt the pressure and used that to motivate themselves. Five under 15:00. Eight PR's out of nine. Eight 2015 runners now in the top 30 All-Time for Sandburg runners. Our fastest 5-man team at Detweiller ever. Mission accomplished - a successful road trip to Peoria. Now we move onward.