The operative word was heat: sweltering, shimmering, sweat-provoking, sun-driven heat. At 7 AM, before the sun even made its appearance, it was already 79 degrees. That was the coolest it would be. After that, the best you could do was try not to think about it.
“Oh yes, it was hot!” said Yussah Aa-Deek, an expert on the subject. Yussah, a sophomore running for University High School, is a Muslim. As such, she competes in clothing that covers her from from head to toe: hijab, long-sleeved shirt and sweat pants. Nonetheless, she has the perfect solution to running on hot days.
“I complain a lot. I put sun block on my face and hands and deal with it. The other girls at least feel the wind on their face and in their hair….”
Running a time that was well off her best of 27:37, she wouldn’t have been opposed to compete earlier than the scheduled (8:35) start.
“It would have been better if we were the first ones to run.”
Contrary to established practise, the meet director chose to run a combined boys and girls JV race at 8:00. This was just peachy keen for Colonial junior Christian Hernandez. Despite running an 18:20 in his very first varsity race at Lakeland last week--he only started running XC this year--Christian was bumped down to the JV race because of a missed practice. He ran a smart, patient race.
“I tried to keep in mind what coach Calhoun said. “Don’t start out in front. Use the first mile as a warm up and move up from there. Usually, in a race where you’re not the fastest the coach tells you to pick a target (runners ahead of him) and pick them off one at a time. I was in the lead, so I didn’t have to do that.
(Perfect advice. One overly enthusiastic sprinter tried to lead the race from start to finish and paid for his inexperience dearly.)
“At the first mile, I was around 30th (5:45). Andres Ramirez (2nd in 18:44) and I tried to stay focused. At two miles we started to make the break. We both got the lead (over James Parker of Boone). We held our position. In the last 800 Andres told me he couldn’t go any more, so I took it out.”
Although finishing 1-2, Colonial didn’t make it into the team scoring. “We only had five to start and one of our guys didn’t finish the race.”
That certainly wasn’t Boone’s problem. With Colonial out of the picture, they scored 1-2-3-4-6-7-10 for a near perfect 16 points and the JV team title. 146 boys competed.
The Oak Ridge Girls JV team, led by winner Shanay Mayes (22:01) won the girls’ team title. Their bright green and gold uniforms (and creative sock combination) seemed to be all over the course…or was it the helter-skelter course itself?
Hernandez summed it up pretty well when he said “The course was confusing and I didn’t know where to run. I lost myself five times. The coach kept telling me where to go.”
Next up was the Girls Varsity, by which time it felt like 100 degrees. One of those big orange cones that marked the course--there were dozens and dozens of them, all over the place--suddenly and without warning attacked a group of girls. According to witnesses, several of the girls went down, one or two head first. The referees, seeing this from a hundred yards away, saw “contact between athletes.” It took more three shots of the starter’s pistol before all of the girls slowed and stopped. On the way back to the starting line, a trio of Seabreeze girls could be overheard: “There goes my sprint!” “A five minute race.” And “I need water.” Best of all was a coach from Deland, Jim Lowenstein’s, request, “Lionel, don’t be in a hurry to restart them.”
After a delay of several minutes, Lionel and Derek restarted the race…but the “killer cone” was still there, waiting to strike again. Luckily, a parent who knows defensive cone techniques, had the courage to tackle, subdue, and remove it to the sidelines.
“After all that,” she was overheard saying, “they didn’t even move the cone!”
None of this seemed to faze Boone junior Brittany Koziara. Her mind was trained on the only person in the field who could challenge her.
“I knew that I’d have competition from Alyssa Burkert (Ocoee). I took out the pace pretty fast and just kept going. I just kept thinking to myself, ‘I can do this’ “
“In the last mile I picked up the pace, little by little. I shattered my time from last year (22:17) and even beat my PR (18:33).” She ran 18:32.16. Half a second faster, and she would have won the JV boys race.
Perhaps that comes from the strength Koziara has found in training with the boys at Boone--not to mention the 600 miles she ran over the summer-- which made all the difference in this year’s spectacular start. She hopes her season will end just as stellar.
“I want to finish in the top four (in the state).”
Not long after Koziara exited the chute, a teammate collapsed from the heat. It became necessary to call the Seminole County Emergency Services. Their truck effectively blocked the start of the Varsity Boys race and the officials delayed the start. They eventually fired the gun at 10:00 and 134 boys were finally launched in the last race of the day.
The fast-paced start wore out the leaders, whose place was eagerly taken over by those just behind them, and they in turn were overtaken by yet another tier of runners. It wasn’t unusual for a runner to pass twenty or thirty runners. Take, for example, sophomore Steven Fernandez of Colonial.
“I thought I started too fast. The heat and mud were getting to me…especially the mud.”
This would be the same mud that started the day as a shallow depression filled with standing water. Hundreds of feet tramping through it all morning turned it into a quagmire.
“At 1 ½ miles I started to push it. I think the Boone guy (Jake Schooler) was pacing off me. At the baseball field, with 800 meters to go, I gave it all I had.”
What he had (17:12) was two seconds more than second place finisher, Phillip Diamond (17:14) of Lake Howell.
“Oh yes, it was hot!” said Yussah Aa-Deek, an expert on the subject. Yussah, a sophomore running for University High School, is a Muslim. As such, she competes in clothing that covers her from from head to toe: hijab, long-sleeved shirt and sweat pants. Nonetheless, she has the perfect solution to running on hot days.
“I complain a lot. I put sun block on my face and hands and deal with it. The other girls at least feel the wind on their face and in their hair….”
Running a time that was well off her best of 27:37, she wouldn’t have been opposed to compete earlier than the scheduled (8:35) start.
“It would have been better if we were the first ones to run.”
Contrary to established practise, the meet director chose to run a combined boys and girls JV race at 8:00. This was just peachy keen for Colonial junior Christian Hernandez. Despite running an 18:20 in his very first varsity race at Lakeland last week--he only started running XC this year--Christian was bumped down to the JV race because of a missed practice. He ran a smart, patient race.
“I tried to keep in mind what coach Calhoun said. “Don’t start out in front. Use the first mile as a warm up and move up from there. Usually, in a race where you’re not the fastest the coach tells you to pick a target (runners ahead of him) and pick them off one at a time. I was in the lead, so I didn’t have to do that.
(Perfect advice. One overly enthusiastic sprinter tried to lead the race from start to finish and paid for his inexperience dearly.)
“At the first mile, I was around 30th (5:45). Andres Ramirez (2nd in 18:44) and I tried to stay focused. At two miles we started to make the break. We both got the lead (over James Parker of Boone). We held our position. In the last 800 Andres told me he couldn’t go any more, so I took it out.”
Although finishing 1-2, Colonial didn’t make it into the team scoring. “We only had five to start and one of our guys didn’t finish the race.”
That certainly wasn’t Boone’s problem. With Colonial out of the picture, they scored 1-2-3-4-6-7-10 for a near perfect 16 points and the JV team title. 146 boys competed.
The Oak Ridge Girls JV team, led by winner Shanay Mayes (22:01) won the girls’ team title. Their bright green and gold uniforms (and creative sock combination) seemed to be all over the course…or was it the helter-skelter course itself?
Hernandez summed it up pretty well when he said “The course was confusing and I didn’t know where to run. I lost myself five times. The coach kept telling me where to go.”
Next up was the Girls Varsity, by which time it felt like 100 degrees. One of those big orange cones that marked the course--there were dozens and dozens of them, all over the place--suddenly and without warning attacked a group of girls. According to witnesses, several of the girls went down, one or two head first. The referees, seeing this from a hundred yards away, saw “contact between athletes.” It took more three shots of the starter’s pistol before all of the girls slowed and stopped. On the way back to the starting line, a trio of Seabreeze girls could be overheard: “There goes my sprint!” “A five minute race.” And “I need water.” Best of all was a coach from Deland, Jim Lowenstein’s, request, “Lionel, don’t be in a hurry to restart them.”
After a delay of several minutes, Lionel and Derek restarted the race…but the “killer cone” was still there, waiting to strike again. Luckily, a parent who knows defensive cone techniques, had the courage to tackle, subdue, and remove it to the sidelines.
“After all that,” she was overheard saying, “they didn’t even move the cone!”
None of this seemed to faze Boone junior Brittany Koziara. Her mind was trained on the only person in the field who could challenge her.
“I knew that I’d have competition from Alyssa Burkert (Ocoee). I took out the pace pretty fast and just kept going. I just kept thinking to myself, ‘I can do this’ “
“In the last mile I picked up the pace, little by little. I shattered my time from last year (22:17) and even beat my PR (18:33).” She ran 18:32.16. Half a second faster, and she would have won the JV boys race.
Perhaps that comes from the strength Koziara has found in training with the boys at Boone--not to mention the 600 miles she ran over the summer-- which made all the difference in this year’s spectacular start. She hopes her season will end just as stellar.
“I want to finish in the top four (in the state).”
Not long after Koziara exited the chute, a teammate collapsed from the heat. It became necessary to call the Seminole County Emergency Services. Their truck effectively blocked the start of the Varsity Boys race and the officials delayed the start. They eventually fired the gun at 10:00 and 134 boys were finally launched in the last race of the day.
The fast-paced start wore out the leaders, whose place was eagerly taken over by those just behind them, and they in turn were overtaken by yet another tier of runners. It wasn’t unusual for a runner to pass twenty or thirty runners. Take, for example, sophomore Steven Fernandez of Colonial.
“I thought I started too fast. The heat and mud were getting to me…especially the mud.”
This would be the same mud that started the day as a shallow depression filled with standing water. Hundreds of feet tramping through it all morning turned it into a quagmire.
“At 1 ½ miles I started to push it. I think the Boone guy (Jake Schooler) was pacing off me. At the baseball field, with 800 meters to go, I gave it all I had.”
What he had (17:12) was two seconds more than second place finisher, Phillip Diamond (17:14) of Lake Howell.