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Meet @ USM-Gorham

January 6, 2012 (Night)

Exercise Type: Run

Weather: N/A

Comments:
Talk about a big surprise. I went into this meet expecting some disappointing or, at best, decent performances. I walked away with the best race of my life (both in time and strategy) and two PRs overall.

Time for everyone's favorite play-by-play: despite my low expectations (I believe I was hoping for around 2:12 in the 8, but realistically I expected a bit slower), I was actually fairly excited to race. Leading up to the meet I kept imagining different scenarios in my head, everything from a sub-2 breakaway to a 2:20 disappointment. When I got the meet and the 800 was getting closer, I got nervous like I normally do, but there was still an underlying excitement. The seeds showed a pretty strong field, including Tom Rasche, Nestor Taylor, and Liam Campbell in front of me, all with seeds in the 2:05 range while my seed was my PR, 2:08. Between my seed and expected time of 2:12 there were quite a few more people, including Spencer, so while I wasn't sure that I'd score I did expect to be pushed to run my best.

Anyway, on the starting line Rasche was missing and Liam and Thomas were both tired from the mile (although the former still managed a 2:10), so I was seeded second. The race went out a pretty good pace, and I forced myself to sprint the first curve to get in a good position—my days of negative splitting the 800 are over—which put me in second where I would stay the rest of the race. Nestor is a strong 800 runner so he knew what he was doing, and I just trailed him the entire race. We hit the first 2 in a comfortable 29.mid, then slowed up for a 61 or 62. I was feeling comfortable until the 3rd lap where I had to force myself to keep contact with Nestor. Normally I would have let him gap me with the false pretense that I'd catch him later, but no more. I didn't catch my next split, but the rest of the race went as you'd expect, with me on Nestor's tail through to the end, where I finished in 2:05.82 to his 2:05.mid. I would have never expected a PR like that this season, especially so early in the season, and it took awhile to get the smile off of my face. More impressive than my long-overdue PR was Spencer's race. He was right behind me the entire time, and came through in 2:06.low to smash my freshman record by over 4 seconds. It was a bit of a bummer since I only had that record for two years, but considering how committed he is compared to my freshman (and current) self, it's to be expected.

This definitely bodes well for our 4x8 though. Thomas has been beating both of us in every workout, so, for argument's sake, let's say he's 2:05 material right now and will drop to 2:03 by outdoor states. Spencer and I can easily be around 2:04-5, and Tim ran a 2:04 last year not going full speed. Put those together and you have 8:16, which beats the outdoor school record by a good second. Just food for thought...

Okay, time to wrap this up. I was on the 4x2 B team and ran a nice .4 second PR, 24.8 seconds. As it is I beat Murry but Caswell beat me. Overall it's too up in the air right now and all we know is that 2 of the three of us will be on the 4x2 at States. I'd love to get one of those spots but I'm at a disadvantage since they do sprint training and I do distance, so I'll have to make do with Plyos and lifting and hope for the best.