Home for the Holidays

Is there life for runners after high school? Yeah, sure there is... but it doesn't always resemble the frenetic, highly-charged, week-to-week existence of the Newton North track and field athlete. It's never more evident than during winter vacation when so many Newton North alumni are home visiting friends and families. Let's catch up with a few of them to find out how their running careers have moved on since their days at North.

It was quite a sight on Tuesday afternoon to see Chris Barnicle and Dan King doing 200s together at Reggie, weaving around crowds of oblivious 15- and 16-year-olds. As readers of this blog know, Chris is running XC and track at Arkansas. He says he'll be racing the mile on January 13th at the Arkansas Invitational in Fayetteville. No word on whether he and his mates might run a distance medley team at the Boston Indoor Games. Dan, a former state champ in the 200 meters, is now a junior at Duke, where he concentrates on the 400. On December 24, he ran 48.7 at the BU mini-meet to win against another former Mass. HS star, Mansfield's Terry Young.

Also working out at Reggie were former teammates and all-scholastics Liz Fulton and Simone Weisman. Liz attends Yale and is running indoor track, but admits freely that school is more important to her right now than track. Simone is attending Middlebury, where she has become good friends with former Wellesley standout Alexandra Krieg.

With my duaghter Joni home for a few weeks, I have had a chance to catch up with several of her friends from the Newton North class of 2002. Sam Ronfard, one of the captains of the undefeated 2001 XC team, is about to start his final semester at Tufts, and plans to spend at least a year teaching in the New York City Public School system after he graduates. Sam also ran the Paris Marathon last Fall with his dad, and has dreams of runnning in Boston in 2007. Two other members of that 2001 team, Ben Heidlage and Gerrit Albertson are also visiting this week. Ben is finishing up his senior year at Pomona and is in the process of applying to law schools. Gerrit is attending Vassar and is working in his senior thesis in Art History. Neither of them has admitted to doing any running lately.

Azuree Catledge, now a freshman at Howard University, was at Reggie last week doing a workout. I didn't have a chance to talk to her, so I'm not sure what event -- long jump, triple, hurdles, sprints -- she will be focusing on this winter.

Newton North assistant coach Shawn Wallace, an accomplished middle-distance ace at BC, made his return to competition after a couple of years off, running a 4:31 mile at the BU Mini-meet. Wallace, a former sub 4:10 miler, won his heat by almost 80 meters. Watch out Dave Polgar!