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| Long-time friend and wildman Jeff Potter |
Zach Johnson’s 1600m run on Saturday at Wheaton North High School during the Falcon Best Four Invite is, simply put, the reason why I love the sport of running. I started writing this expecting to complaining about my disappointments in athletics, motivated in part by Win Win and also my anticipation of starting up my running this week after a two week hiatus (my longest intentional break in 5 and a half years). Running has been far and away my most defining interest since starting as a freshman in high school (to stay in shape for football, believe it or not) but despite all the ways running has changed my life for the better it has always been more common for me to focus on the many negatives and the failures of my career.
Yet it was this painstakingly shy senior with a bowl cut reminiscent of my underclassmen years who shook me from my pity party. I’ve had the pleasure of being a teammate, spectator, and now, coach of Zach during his stint on the cross-country team. He is one of the hardest-working people I have known, and he takes every achievement with admirable humility, every disappointment with grace unmatched in his peers. The guy has overcome a severe knee injury in addition to overall physical limitations to be a varsity contributor on a talented squad. He is not the fastest or most popular, but Zach is the god-damn business if you ask this guy.
So when Zach came screaming out the gate on Saturday, I thought to myself, ok, a little uncharacteristic of Zach, but I dig it. He came cruising through the 400m mark, and was right on the heels of the leader, and he looked so good that I held back from yelling for him to stay controlled (coach-speak for slow the fuck down). I didn’t think he could keep the pace, but it would probably set him up for a modest personal best, when he would falter. But with his mop of hair flying behind him, he kept the pace, even making a move for the lead with 500m to go, on pace to absolutely crush his previous 4:49 marking.
It was getting late in the race, but any runner or spectator knows that one lap is plenty of time for something to go dreadfully wrong. I have seen plenty of hopefuls tear into the bell lap with a fury, only to stagger down the homestretch for what seems like eternity. And this was Zach MF Johnson, someone who had no business leading this race, much less looking effortless doing it. But good ol’ Z-Johns, utilizing every inch of his wiry, emaciated frame, kicked home with such ferocity that a shiver went through my entire body, and he crossed the finish line in first, with a clocking of 4:33, an unbelievable 16-second personal record.
Sprinting over to my wearied athlete and friend, I shook him, spewing incoherent exclamations, fricatives, and naturally a good amount of saliva. Once he grasped the magnitude of his accomplishment, he- returning to the Zach Johnson we know and love- managed only a sheepish grin. The moment was so pure, so perfect; for the moment every frustration I had ever had with running was forgotten, and I was able to share in the unadulterated ecstasy of the culmination of years of Zach's hard work.
Suffice to say, I felt that posting my bellyaching over my running career was not an adequate tribute to a sport that can inspire such a satisfying moment. Yet, enjoyable as that moment was, it is understandably just as infrequent. It might be hard to imagine that some people are born to run in a circle better than others, but it is the one inescapable fact pertaining to running. Many coaches and athletes like to believe that it’s all about who works the hardest, who runs the most miles, and who is the toughest. In a vacuum, this is true; between two people of the same talent, barring injuries or illness, the one who runs more, harder, and who is tougher will win. That is hardly breaking news. But we do not live in a vacuum, and injuries and illness exist all to frequently. Instead, it is exceedingly rare that hardest-working, most-dedicated runner crosses the line first. This is especially in high school, where most races come down to God-given talent, and whether or not the coach was smart enough to get out of the kids way and keep them fresh and hungry.
Two prominent examples of talent prevailing are Micah Vandenend and Jeff Thode. Vandenend of Glenbard South High School suffered a stress fracture in his right fibula, missing all of the outdoor season until the sectional meet in 2001, yet unbelievably managed to qualify for the state meet, and went on to place 9th, and garner All-State honors. The next year during cross-country, Vendenend re-aggravated the same injury, and missed the majority of the season. Coming back to run the necessary meets in the postseason, he proceeded to win both regionals and sectionals, and then shockingly, the 2001 Cross-Country State meet.
Even more surprising was the victor of the 2008 IHSA meet Conant High School’s Jeff Thode. Thode had suffered a collapsed lung midseason, and was assumed to be done for the year. However, he was cleared only two weeks before the state meet to compete. After running well at sectionals, Thode continued on to capture the state title and his win became one of the wildest spectacles ever to transpire on the magical soil of Peoria’s Detwieler Park.
Haters gon’ hate, though, and many would be quick to point out two recent examples that would refute my opinion. York Community High School, owners of 26 IHSA cross-country state champions, is a perennial powerhouse in distance running, and Coach Joe Newton has cemented their status as the most dominant prep program in the nation through good ol’ fashioned high mileage and break-neck intensity (however, during their track season, they are significantly more conservative). Reigning two-time IHSA cross-country champion and USA Junior Triathalon Champion Lukas Verzbikas, considered to be the one of the finest American running prodigies ever, may not run a crazy amount of miles, but he supplements his training with a significant amount of swimming and biking, the sum of which leaves little room for anything else.
I would argue that these two examples are the exceptions that prove the rule. According to Jim Halley of USA Today in a 2008 article, York “regularly carries more than 200 boys runners”, an unfathomable number for high school prep athletics. There are 3A (largest school division in Illinois) teams that struggle to bring the mandatory 5 runners to the line. When you have this many runners, a coach can implement a much more aggressive approach- running a majority of the team through a high-risk, high-reward plan knowing that it will eventually manufacture the necessary five to seven exceptional runners.
This running-the-gauntlet approach is no doubt why York has had the unparalleled prep success on the state and national level. But at what expense? Kevin Moore, a former trainer for York during the late 90’s, told me that the number of runners that were too injured to compete was upwards of 60 high schoolers throughout the entire season. To put it in perspective, the Wheaton North team on average has between 40-50 runners total on their roster, and is considered a large team. While the varsity crew of runners is basking in their prolific gains, others who have worked just as hard or harder are left on the sidelines, licking their wounds.
Another issue that arises from this training is a lack of development after high school; just ask former York national-caliber runners, Eric and Matt Dettman twins (Oregon), Sean MacNamara (Michigan), Tom Achtien (Illinois) and Jordan Hebert (Illinois) all of who, have struggled to meet the sky-high expectations set by their accolades attained in high school. This particular argument always stirs up a whole lot of shit, so I’ll just leave it at this: some elite high schoolers, while young enough to initially respond to high-intensity training, are ultimately limited in their potential, as too much physical stress was put upon them during their impressionable years.
And as far as young phenom, Lukas Verzbikas, his mother is a former Lithuanian record holder in the 1500m and 3000m distances, boasting jaw-dropping personal bests of 4:09 and 8:56, respectively. Need I say anymore? (A little perspective, my personal bests, embarrassingly enough, are 4:08 and 8:52) For those of you who still don’t grasp the magnitude of those times, I will just say that the genetics in that kid’s Lithuanian blood are the envy of about every other runner in the country. For this reason, I can’t help but scoff when Rasa Verzbickiene, Lukas’ mother, is quoted as saying “You know, an Olympic gold medal is 95 percent very hard work and 3 percent talent and 2 percent good luck”. I certainly don’t doubt that an unworldly amount of effort and perseverance that goes into achieving these marks, but she is kidding herself in placing talent at a measly 3 percent.
Yet it is these exceptions that become the model for success for the vast majority of programs and athletes, trying to emulate every aspect of these immense programs and talents without heeding their own lack of resources or biological constraints. And yes, this does produce a team here or there, the odd individual runner, but on the whole, it is a devastating approach for these misinformed athletes. Not only does this approach lead to injuries, fatigue, and as a result, athletic disappointment for these runners, but this group also attributes this disappointment to “choking”. Because they are following a get-fast-quick scheme, which they perceive as a training Bible, any failure that occurs is immediately chalked up to their own mental or motivational shortcomings, as they have, in their minds, done everything necessary from the physical perspective. Either that, or they think they must just have to run more and harder; you can see how this flawed strategy could snowball very quickly.
I feel a little silly typing this, because I am one of the worst offenders. I’ve fought tooth and nail with both my high school and college coaches to give me more mileage, to let me run faster workouts, and when they wouldn’t, I would proceed un-sanctioned. I ran 80- to 90-mile weeks my junior and senior years in high school, even 100-mile weeks during the summer prior to my freshman year at Wheaton. It was during these years I had the attitude that my close friend and former coach Jeff Potter (above) describes when asked about his scruffy appearance during his college years: “All I wanted to do was run.”
This may seem like nothing short of insanity for those of you outside the circle of madness that is the running culture, but this sums up the attitude that myself and many other harriers take up during the height of their training. I wanted nothing more than to run well. I didn’t care about my appearance, I didn’t care about socializing, and I certainly didn’t care about school. My desire to succeed transcended every aspect of my life. Every meal I ate was planned according to what was expended during the run before it, and what was required for the run after. I would avoid instances where I would have to be standing or outside for extended periods of time (church, social events, sporting events, the like) and refused to participate in any physical exertion that wasn’t in my explicit training plan.
After years of this attitude (admittedly there were lapses in my steadfastness), I was regressing in the basket in which I had placed all my eggs. I did have races at points during the season that were indicative of my training, but when I had to be at my best, I simply wasn’t. I fell pitifully short of goals and expectations, and even worse, let my teammates down on multiple occasions. And as I previously explained, my first reaction was to heap criticism on my mental preparation and the effort I was putting in. Being that I was so invested in the sport, I considered this “mental weakness” and “laziness” to be major personal flaws.
And this is all because I was to prideful to take the biological hint, even after each season ended worse than the previous. While I fully realized that I was better off at lower mileage, I refused to accept it because it meant accepting that I had a limited potential, admitting to myself that my ceiling was not that of most of my peers that I ran with in high school. I caused myself a lot of unnecessary injuries and poor races in striving to be the best, instead of being the best that I can be.
But this mentality, however flawed it may be, is still what produces the best runners, the best stories. It is impossible to know the limits of a runner until these limits are sufficiently tested, and that’s where coaching comes in. A coach can come in and look at a runner’s career unemotionally and with previous experience to draw on, and therefore he can formulate an unbiased, professional opinion. I would’ve done well to listen to coaches earlier in my career, but the silver lining is that I’ve learned a lesson that will serve me extremely well in pursuing a career as a coach.
So, thanks to Zach’s race prompting a closer look at my running career, I've gleaned this practical application to my coaching future. I can get all caught up in the sport’s prevalent injustices, but when it comes down to it, I could never be without running. As corny as it sounds, I love the sport for all that it is, and I always will based on this one truth: there is nothing sweeter than partaking in the fruits of labor with my athletes whose literal blood, sweat, and tears stain the track.
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