NNHS Alumni Results - 4/24/10

On Saturday, 4/24, Tufts hosted the 2010 NESCAC Track and Field Championships. Bowdoin freshman Michele Kaufman finished 2nd in the 100m hurdles, running 15.36 in the trials and 15.31 in the finals. Kaufman also competed in the long jump, where she placed 9th with a leap of 16-8, and the triple jump, where she placed 7th with a leap of 35-0.25.

Bates College senior Doug Brecher competed in the 10,000m, running 33:28. Doug is much faster than that, so there must have been extenuating circumstances. Whatever the story, we hope it's nothing serious.

On Friday, Stonehill College hosted the Skyhawk Invitational meet. BU senior David Polgar placed 4th in the 1500m in 4:00.58, finishing behind old rivals Pat Fullertpn (1st, 3:51.53) and now BU-teammate Robert Gibson (2nd 3:53.40). Another NNHS alum, now Bentley sophomore, Steven Long, competed in the shot put and discus. Long placed 4th in the shot (43-10.75) and 5th in the disc (128-8).

Noah Jampol ran 4:14.19 for 1500 to place 7th at the Millersville Metrics meet in Millersville, PA on Saturday.

A belated shout-out to John Blouin, who competed in last Monday's Boston Marathon, finishing in 2:55:32. I'm positive there must have been many other NNHS alumni in the race. Anyone got names? Clayton Lloyd wrote to tell me that his mom was running. Anyone else?

NNHS Alumni Results 4/16/10 - 4/17/10

Running his first big outdoor race of the spring, NNHS alum Chris Barnicle had another solid personal best in the 5000m on Friday, running 13:36.02 to finish with the middle of the pack in the fast heat of the 5K at the Mt. Sac Invitational.

In New England, the wet and cold weather wasn't particularly conducive to running blazing times. At the Solomon Invitational in Dedham, Northeastern sophomore Jess Barton ran a solo 11:17.53 in the 3000m steeplechase. At the same meet, Dave Polgar and Seb Putzeys renewed their inadvertent indoor rivalry, this time in the 1500. Dave edged Seb for NNHS alumni bragging rights, running 4:02.64 for 3rd just ahead of Seb's 4:03.24 in 4th.

At the State of Maine Championships, Bates sophomore Ben Chebot ventured into the water, so to speak, placing 6th in the steeplechase in 10:23.53. At the same meet, Bates senior and soon-to-be responsible citizen Doug Brecher placed 6th in the 5000m, running 15:23.12.

Johns Hopkins senior Noah Jampol doubled in the 1500 and 800 at the Widener Invitational over the weekend, running 4:20.40 and 2:09.31, respectively.

At the Springfield Invitational, Cailean Robinson placed 3rd in the 100m in 10.90, and ran a leg on Wheaton College's winning 4x100 relay team, which recorded an NCAA provisional mark of 41.37.

Newton Girls Over Weymouth in Another Epic Clash

The Newton North girls have improved since winning the State Indoor Title two months ago, but they still had everything they could handle against an impressive Weymouth team Wednesday. In the end, the Tigers prevailed 71-65 with impressive sprinting, key points in the throwing events, and the overall depth.

An early highlight was the NN sweep of the 100m, with Carla Forbes crossing the line first in 12.8, followed by junior D'jaidah Wynn (still hurting from a basketball injury) in 12.9, and Steph Brown in 13.0.

In the hurdles, Weymouth's Emily Clark had another terrific meet against North, winning the 100m event in a school record 15.3, and then winning the 400m hurdles in 66.9, with Amy Ren taking 2nd in both events. Clark also won the high jump (5-1), and finished 4th in the Javelin.

In general, Weymouth was the better team on the track, winning both hurdle events, the 400, 800, mile, and 4 x 400 relay, and outscoring NN 44-38. The Tigers were stronger in the field events, especially the throws. Tatiana Froehlich won the discus (102-5) with Monet Lowe 3rd, Lowe took first in the shot (33-11) with Megan Gentile 3rd (32-6), and Amy Lu and Emily Hutchinson took 2nd and 3rd in the javelin.

At the risk of repeating myself, the prohibition against distance doubling again resulted in an huge imbalance in the impact made by Forbes and Clark, compared to say Gillis and Corcoran. Forbes, an indoor state champion in the long jump, won four events (100, 200, LJ, TJ) earning 20 points. Clark won three events (100h, 400h, HJ), to score 15. Gillis, an indoor state champion in the 1000 and outdoor state champ in the 800, won the 2-mile and then was shelved for a couple of hours to run a leg on the losing 4x400 relay, scoring a total of 5 points. Surely there's something wrong with this picture!

Article in Newton Tab

(Incomplete) Results on athletic.net

Weymouth - Undefeated Since 2009

It would be an overstatement to say that the unthinkable happened yesterday, when the Weymouth boys accomplished what no other Bay State team has been able to accomplish since 2000 by beating Newton North in an outdoor track meet. The remarkable thing about the Tigers unbeaten streak is that they won many close meets during that run, stepping up to challenge after challenge from very good teams.

But yesterday was Weymouth's day. The Wildcats won 72-63 and you don't do that against NN without both individual stars and depth in all events. Weymouth dominated the hurdles (sweeping both the 110 and 400 hurdles), with sophomore Tyler Mulcahy recording two wins to go with a 3rd-place in the long jump. The Wildcats also swept the javelin and long jump, and picked up one of the most unexpected points of all when senior Sam Calley took 3rd in the shot put ahead of 50-footer Conor Ebbs.

Weymouth won 5 of the 8 individual track events. Except for the ridiculous league prohibition against distance doubling, Steve Sollowin and Chris Dooley likely would have added to the Weymouth point total, "settling" for single wins in the 800 and mile. Why is it that an athlete like Mulcahy is allowed to compete in four events, contributing 11 of a possible 20 points to Weymouth's effort, while Sollowin, one of the top middle distance runners in the state is relegated to a supporting role in the mile and 4x400 relay, for a maximum of 6.25 points.

But one happy result was that it made for a great two-mile, with Jake Gleason running 9:58.5 for the win over Weymouth's Kody Crawford.

North won both relays, but by the time Ezra Lichtman, Ryan Kwan, Justin Keefe, and Isaiah Penn got the stick around first in the 4x400 (3:34.9), the meet had long since been decided.

By the way, Newton North Track historian Josh Seeherman wrote to dispel any notion of a 13-year streak. he writes:

"...the last outdoor loss was to Brookline in the Spring of 2000 - ten years and not twelve like some folks are saying. That Brookline team featured the Abdur-Rahim brothers, who were very very talented multi-event athletes..."

So ten years. Still an amazing, impressive record of excellence.

We'll give the last word to Coach Blackburn, as quoted in the lengthy article in the Newton paper this morning (below):

"I'm very proud of how we've done in both indoors and outdoors... I think if you combine them, it's something like 150 wins counting indoor and outdoor for the past 12 years. And obviously there's pride because you know how hard the guys worked to get that. Each group didn't want to be the ones to lose, and that kind of motivated people every year. I think this year it was just a little too much to overcome against a good team like Weymouth."

Article in Newton Tab (incorrectly mentions 13-year streak)

Meet Results on athletic.net

NN Teams Open Outdoor Season with Wins at Brookline

With the temperature pushing 90 degrees in early April, yesterday's opening meet of the outdoor season was like a state meet in June. In general, performances kept pace with the mercury, as Newton North boys and girls each scored impressive victories against Brookline at Downes Field.

For the girls, the Indoor State Champions might be even better outdoors. For one thing, Carla Forbes has both the long and triple jumps to dominate (winning both yesterday in 17-10 and 39-3, respectively). For another, North has a 100m sprinter faster than Forbes (Djaidah Winn 12.8 in her track debut). My goodness.

For the boys, there are gaps, to be sure, but not many. North's indoor domination of the shot put looks like it will extend to the discus as well. Yesterday Conor Ebbs won both, throwing 144-7 in the discus and 50-11 in the shot.

NN Boys results on Athletic.net

Meet results from the Newton Tab

Robinson, Brecher Win Events at Jim Sheehan Meet

Newton North alums won the longest and the shortest events on the track at the Jim Sheehan Memorial meet, held at Fitchburg State College on Saturday.

Wheaton College sophomore Cailean Robinson had a great day, winning the 100m (10.94), the 200m (21.59), and blazing a leg on the winning 4x100 relay (41.12).

In the 10000m, Bates senior Doug Brecher crushed the field, running 32:39.97 to win by over a minute. Teammate Ben Chebot finished 12th in 36:40.79.

The ageless Dave Cahill ran the 800 in 2:03.37.

Meanwhile, Northeastern competed at the UNH Wildcat Invitational in Durham NH on Saturday and NN alums produced a pair of strong performances in the metric mile. Seb Putzeys ran a very solid 4:02.67 to take 2nd in the mens 1500, and Jess Barton finished 6th in the women's 1500 in 4:45.45.

NNHS 2010 Outdoor Track Schedule

The Red Sox open their season on Sunday against the Yankees, and Newton North Outdoor Track opens THEIR season against Brookline on Tuesday.

The complete NN schedule, according to HighSchoolSports.net is below:

Tue 4/6 - NN @ Brookline, 3:45p
Fri 4/9 - NN @ Milton, 3:45p
Wed 4/14 - NN v. Weymouth, 3:45p
Tue 4/20 - NN @ Wellesley, 10:00a
Tue 4/27 - NN @ Braintree, 3:45p
Sat 5/1 - FR/SO Meet, 9:30a
Tue 5/4 - NN @ Needham, 3:45p
Sat 5/8 - State Coaches, 9:30a
Wed 5/12 - NN @ Framingham, 3:45p
Sat 5/15 - State Relays, 9:30a
Tue 5/18 - BSC League Meet, 3:45p
Sat 5/22 - So Shore Meet (girls), 9:30a
Fri 5/28 - Div I State Meet, TBA
Sat 6/5 - All-State Meet

Throwing the Distance

I have to admit that coaching many of the field events in track and field still fills me with anxiety. I'm always afraid that I'm teaching something wrong, or teaching the wrong thing (which I think is different). Often, it feels like I'm only slightly ahead of my novice throwers and jumper and hurdlers as we learn these exotic events together.

But occasionally I experience a little bit of success, and that's very exciting. And sometimes, even my experience as a distance runner turns out to have an unexpected applicability to some other event.

A case in point: the best athlete on the Concord Academy Track and Field team is a boy named Olaf Prilo, and he doesn't run the mile or two-mile; he throws the javelin. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not responsible for Olaf's skill in his chosen event. In fact, he has throwing in the blood, so to speak. His father was an Olympic hopeful in his native Norway and taught the son to throw with proper technique while he was still a youngster.

Last summer, the father was transferred to the U.S. and the Boston area for a two-year assignment, and the son enrolled at CA in the fall as a 17-year-old junior. My first communication with Olaf was an email from him in late November asking me about Spring track and opportunities to compete in the Javelin throw. There was also a slightly shocking request: would I help him train through the winter? In spite of my ignorance of the event, he wanted suggestions for how to improve his fitness and admitted that he felt like he had hit a plateau, and wanted to try something different in hopes of a big improvement in the coming year.

As chance would have it, the first time we met I happened to be carrying Arthur Lydiard's "Running to the Top," and Olaf asked me about it, and we ended up having quite a discussion about Lydiard's methods and his success. I explained how many people mistakenly thought Lydiard was all about long slow distance. Not true. Ever the experimenter, Lydiard had found that developing endurance through long, arduous hilly runs through the New Zealand countryside allowed his runners to recruit more and more muscle fibers and deploy fast-twitch fibers more effectively at the end of races. Lydiard's runners had great kicks, because they were able to use the speed they DID have to greatest advantage.

For some reason, this idea really appealed to Olaf and he asked if anyone had ever tried Lydiard training in the throwing events. I replied by saying that Lydiard himself argued that his training was broadly applicable to sports other than distance running, but that, no, I wasn't aware of any "long slow throwers."

Almost as a joke, we came up with a plan for a thrower that was based on the total distance thrown in practice, rather than the usual focus on drills and non-throwing activities like strength work. I sketched out a plan similar to what I would give a runner beginning a base building period, but I cut the "mileage" (that is, the distance thrown) to 1/5th what a runner would do (it would have been absurd, otherwise). So for a week, the thrower would throw maybe 800 meters of distance, and gradually build up the volume over a period of many months, eventually throwing for miles. Anyway, it was fun to brainstorm about this crazy training, but I thought no more about it until a few weeks later when I heard from Olaf again. He had actually been doing the "workouts" I had sketched out using a turbojav that he was throwing for 30 minutes a day, and he wanted more.

Now, I really started to panic. I was completely convinced I was going to ruin this talented javelin thrower by having him throwing too much. I also worried what his dad would say. I tried to tell Olaf it had only been a thought experiment, but he was adamant. After a few weeks, he was already feeling much stronger.

I think it was about this time that I asked my friend, Henry Finch who maintains the Newton Running Times blog, whether he knew anything about the Javelin. I vaguely remembered that Henry had had a cousin, Sidd Finch, who had been quite a thrower at one time. Henry and I met a few times to discuss this curious case, but we both felt it was kind of unique. Here was a young thrower with impeccable technique who enjoyed throwing for 30-60 minutes each day. We finally decided that the best advice was to get him to take days off every few days, to avoid potential shoulder injury.

So that's how Olaf Prilo passed the winter. When it was 10 degrees out, he threw with gloves and a parka. When it snowed, he threw in the snow. And little by little, he increased the total distance of his throws.

Last week, he finally abandoned the turbojav and picked up a real javelin again. Even doing easy practice throws, the results were astounding. Last year, he said he was typically throwing 130-140 feet in competition. Now he was throwing well over 170 feet.... In practice.... In March. All by following Lydiard!

Yesterday, Olaf came up to me after practice and asked if he could throw "hard" today. "It's my 18th birthday," he said, "and I would like to throw 180 feet to celebrate."

Whether he does or doesn't reach this milestone on his birthday, this young man, who almost seems to good to be true, is poised for great things. Remember the name Olaf Prilo, he's about to become a legend.

For more pictures of Olaf throwing over the winter, click here.