For those of you who are mathy and numbers driven, here is the meet document with splits and here is the MileStat results page for the meet.

 

The meet began with the field events and it was great to see 26 of our athletes try out the "& Field" half of our sport's name. Many athletes were competing in these events for the very first time, some had only had experience with the event with Coaches Carrier and Dunn in 6th grade PE.

 

The High Jump is the hardest to get into right at the beginning of the season and had our least number of athletes. Freddy and Aidan both cleared 4-6 for personal records, with the veteran eighth grader breaking the tie with fewer misses from previous heights. This was good enough to score with a 3rd and 5th place to go with those personal bests. Luca Testani beat his old personal best from 6th Grade by half a foot, which was enough to secure the eighth place point. Meanwhile, Mike had the biggest gain of the day of 15 inches on just his third day of high jumping in his life!

 

The Long Jump was loaded with athletes, including seven who earned their first mark at the meet, meaning Connor, West, William, Winston, Tate, Arun, and Luca Hall all earned a NEPR (this is Coach Dunn's goofy way of recognizing first marks in an event which stands for New Event Personal Record and is pronounced "neeper"). Cameron and Henry had both jumped with Coach Carrier last winter and showed off how much stronger they've gotten by obliterating their old PBs - Henry by a  huge 20.25 inches and Cameron by a whopping 31.75 inches! Arun showed off some of his Pole Vault trained body control with spectacular run ups and board position for an impressive 15-1 debut. Luca Hall was right behind him with an impressive 14-1 opening. West began his long jump career a mere six inches from our middle school Elite mark for this event with his 15-6 monster of a bound.

 

Shot Put has been an up and coming event for the middle school Saints over the past few years. Friday marked our first Elite Performance in a Field Event for the season, which is also the first field event Elite for this already highly decorated veteran. Davis improved his best throw from the spring by over five FEET to secure his 26-9 mark. This sets him currently as the 9th best middle school Saint in this event all-time. Ivan is knocking on the Elite door as well, only eleven inches from getting his own Elite. This was also a 21 inch PR from last winter! Palmer bested his previous top mark by a foot from where he was in February. Jeb had the second highest improvement, heaving his cannonball FIFTY-FIVE inches further than what he was able to do back in the Spring during the outdoor season. Joining these veterans were also debuts from Bo and Leo, who threw 21-2 and 19-1 respectively. Everyone mentioned so far also scored for the Saints in the meet, making Shot Put our best event of the day, taking 6 of the 8 scoring positions (thanks Coach Cross)! Neepers in this event on Friday were set by JD, Gray Bo, Leo, Chapin, and Colin.

 

The 4x800 was an exciting back and forth battle and set the tone for running PRs with a perfect 8 for 8 athletes earning personal bests. Mike and Tate had never set a mark at this distance so earned their NEPR for finishing their legs of the race. Davis was supposed to take it easy coming off of injury and with a lax tournament to attend the following two days. He didn't. Already Elite in this event from last school year, he dropped his time by 4.5 more seconds to become the 9th fastest 800 runner in StC MS history. The other veterans on the team combined for an ASTOUNDING 109.5 second total drop in PRs! Teddy shed 4.5, Miko dropped 9, Luca Testani was 11 faster, Ely improved by 21, and Gray absolutely crushed his 6th Grade time by 64 seconds. Well done, lads!

 

The 55m dash is a popular race with the fans for its simplicity and raw speed. There's not usually a ton of drama at the middle school level for this event, and certainly not much in the way of come from behind wins, but that's what Bo provided for the spectators Friday afternoon! Coming from a bit behind and surging in the final meters of the race, Bo was able to edge out the sprinter from Franklin Military by a difference that the camera had to break down to the thousandths of a second for first place honors and points, a NEPR, and our third Elite Performance of the day with his 7.65 second time. Bo is currently 15th best on the all-time list for StC MS. Winston, Jeb, Leo, Cameron, Colin, Arun, Tilghman, and JD also earned NEPR marks in the 55.

 

The 1600 saw four of our athletes take to the track for an eight lap race. Aidan led the way for the Saints in this event, earning himself a PR by four seconds and third place in the event for the team. William picked up 7th place points for StC MS as he nearly matched his Time Trial PR. Chapin and Henry are both creeping up on the 6:00 mile mark; Chapin improved by 9, while Henry improved by 15. Sub-6 feels attainable by season's end for these guys as hard as they're working and as quickly as the times are melting away!

 

Friday was the first time this season that the Saints ran a 4x200m relay. This was a race that we did not get many attempts at last year, so it was exciting for the coaches to have two teams competing right off the bat! Our team of Luca Hall, Freddy, Ivan, and Palmer set the season record to beat with a time that is less than 2 seconds away from Elite status and was good for second place points in the meet. Paul, Colin, Tilghman, and James all got their first official 4x2 as well and started with a solid showing. The 4x200 is notoriously difficult to get accurate split times for and they are not super accurate anyway, so we'll rarely report them. The spitball times we got on all 8 guys was pretty encouraging though!

 

The 500m Dash is the longest distance our team races that is still considered a "dash" and not a "run." It is a delicate balance of speed and endurance and widely regarded as a pretty tough event. West took first place in the event with a time that makes him the third guy on the team to be within two seconds of Elite status. Joining West on his "neeper" were fellow first-timers Cameron, Winston, and Leo. Cameron was able to nab fifth place points for his effort and Connor was just one place out of scoring position.

 

The "A Thousand" is Coach Cross's favorite running event for the winter season. The Saints put three athletes in scoring positions for this event, with Luca Testani taking the runner-up position and Mike and Gray coming in at 5th and 6th places challenging each other to the line! Luca also dropped three more seconds since he first raced this event at time trials. Gray also earned his first time in this event, while Teddy effectively tied his Time Trial mark.

 

Next we hustled back across the Field House for the 300m Dash. This event saw several veterans destroy their old times, several in the same heat battling it out against each other! Palmer and Ivan have spent a fair amount of time on the oval together and this friendly rivalry has been fun to watch. They pushed each other to a 1.5 second PR for Ivan and a 2.5 second PR for Palmer also netting 5th and 6th place overall in the process. Arun had the largest drop from time trials, improving five and a half seconds from his previous best. Paul earned another NEPR for his 300 as did Bo, who also took third place honors in the race and is less than a quarter of a second away from Elite status here! 

 

The "Two Mile" slows down the pace of the meet for those hardy enough to give it a go. This event gets Coach Dunn's event-of-the-meet designation this time around. It wasn't flashy, we didn't take first place (or second), but what did happen is emblematic of what we're hoping for in our athletes. Ely and Miko took 3rd and 4th places respectively and each earned a PR. Same as what you've read multiple times so far. The difference is in the perspective of growth over time. Both of these young men were new to running in their 7th grade years and both have had to work to be where they are now, earning little gains here and there over time, often together at practice as they are away from the track. They challenge each other in a positive way and make the other better for it. They did the entire 3200 running on pace with the other (and Coach Carriers time calls) and then blasted the final straight for an amazing finish. Miko bested his PR by 19 seconds while Ely obliterated his time from last winter by 87 seconds. We could not be more proud of these two and as a fun bonus, they are as of the writing of this email, the top two middle school competing 3200m eighth grade athletes on MileSplit not just in Virginia, but the USA (don't worry, I took screenshots). This is not to say that these times are Elite, they still have a bit to go to get there, but that's just one metric. You want to see what it looks like to work hard and make amazing personal growth - look no further than these two role models. Coach Dunn hopes he can be like them when he grows up.

 

The greatest race in Track finishes off the meet - the 4x400m Relay (no bias there I'm sure). Our two teams raced well, and though there were not many personal bests to report here, the race was efficiently done to earn our first place points. Sometimes in track, that's all that needs to be done in a meet. Two guys of the eight did improve their personal bests - Henry dropped 1.5 seconds (perfect 3 for 3 PRs) and West improved by 2 seconds to be the next athlete on the team to be threatening the minute barrier in this event. Notably, Freddy also had a season record in the 400 as he is quickly getting back to where he left off in the Spring. West, Freddy, Luca Hall, and Aidan now hold the season record for the 4x400 for our team. Connor, Chapin, Henry, and William took 5th place points for us and combined to be just over the 5:00 mark.

 

BONUS RESULTS: The day after our Middle School meet, two of our teammates returned to the Field House to help the Upper School with their win by competing in the Pole Vault. Ivan earned a 6 inch PR and 3rd place honors with his 8-6 vault. He is now only 6 inches off of Elite status in Pole Vault. Seventh grader Arun won the event for the Saints with his 10-6 vault (which ties his PR and is his first official vault for the Saints). This vault also earns Arun his first Elite Performance mark AND makes him tied for second place all-time StC MS with Columbia University Track athlete Ian Smith (though Arun gets the edge as he completed this feat as a 7!). The record board in Coach Carrier's room will be updated soon! Congratulations!

 

While the team score comes second to personal improvement, let's be honest, it is nice to win as a squad as well. We outscored second place Franklin Military by 27 points with third place Henley MS nearly 100 points behind us. A solid win, helped by over 40 points from athletes who won't be at our next meet. This is a great opportunity for other team members to step up and take those top spots!

 

Competition and goals often bring out the best in athletes, and MileStat has a fun and interesting tool to help look and compare to other top athletes around the commonwealth - and the USA. You do need to take these rankings with a grain of salt: they only take into account FAT-timed, level-specific events, from meets that use MileStat that have already happened this early in the season, BUT with all that in place, quite a few of our teammates are top ranked in Virginia (and a few of us even have the top rank in the USA in the MileSplit system right now)! Congrats to Luca Testani, Aidan Dunn, Leo Bellanger, Bo Hackney, West Hackney, Arun Mead, Ivan Johnson, and Ely Irving for making these inaugural lists of the season!