(Photos by RAPHAEL BIEBER)
There is one thing that never changes at Goddard State Park, site of the Brown University Northeast Invitational. With its mostly flat terrain, fast times are often the norm at the Warwick, R.I., venue.
Add the fact that Saturday’s event happened on an ideal day for running with a cool 65 degrees on the thermometer and some quality competition on the line, the odds of posting PR performances multiply substantially.
Improving on his best by 16 seconds, Marco Pompilj of New York’s Collegiate School defended his title in the featured Championship Race. Pomilj broke 15 minutes for the first time in his career with a time of 14:56.06.
“Time wasn’t really my priority,” he admitted. “I came here to race. With that comes the time.”
Pompilj, a fourth-place finisher at last year’s N.Y. Federation Championship, withstood a determined Evan Rutto of New Jersey’s St. Benedict Prep during the last stages of the race. In fact, this one went right down to the wire.
With Rutto holding a slight edge coming down the last stretch, Pompilj charged past his rival with just 30 meters remaining to take his second straight win at the regional meet.
“Rutto is a great runner so my plan was to stick with him,” he said. “We actually had a nice group up in the lead at the beginning of the race so we all kind of stuck together. That helped me a lot.”
“(Coming down the last stretch), you always have that thought, ‘Am I going to lose it here?’ You just got to dig in and see what you got,” he continued. “That’s all it takes.”
St. Anthony, N.Y., earned the team crown with a convincing 39-115 win over second-place Collegiate School. The New York school had an impressive 3-5-9 finish from their top three runners – Pat Tucker, Fredrick Buchholz and Joe Tucker.
Shannon Murdock, a senior from Exeter, N.H., was more than 30-seconds faster than her PB in winning the girls’ championship race. She broke the tape in 17:53.27. Sachem East (N.Y.) junior Alexandra Decicco was second at 18:02.03.
“Since I’m from New Hampshire I didn’t really know the competition so I was kind of going for time,” she said. “I did my first mile in 5:30 so I was right on. At mile two it was 11:15, so it was a little slow so I picked it up the last mile.”
With all five of its scoring runners among the first 22 finishers, Sachem East, N.Y., captured the team title with a 40-72 decision over fellow state rival Northport.
Joshua Clark of Highland Regional, N.J., took the Varsity 1 race with a PB of 15:42.96. Finishing second at 16:00.02 was Tosi Alexander of Oyster Bay, N.Y. Highland also won the team title with a 58-122 verdict over Harborfields, N.Y.
Maryland’s Ronan O’Shea of Archbishop Spalding copped the Varsity 2 race with a time of 15:43.76. Luciano Foire of Bay Shore, N.Y., was second at 16:03.94. A pair of New York schools battled for team honors with St. John the Baptist edging Smithtown, 71-78.
O’Shea took the pace out hard, hitting his opening mile in 4:45.
“I wanted a win and if I could get a PR to go with it I would be really happy,” he said. “I was going for the win so I took it out hard…It felt alright. It’s super flat here. It felt hard but it didn’t feel impossible. I have been training to go out hard with our league championships coming up. That’s what I have been practicing in every race, going out hard.”
The fastest time of the day for girls happened in the Varsity 1 race where freshman Katherine Lee of Shoreham-Wading River, N.Y., won her second consecutive title with a time of 17:53.09. She beat sophomore teammate Alexandra Hays, who placed second at 18:34.83. SWR brought home the hardware with a 56-70 victory over Hackley School, N.Y.
Lee was more than 40 seconds quicker than her best.
“I thought I had no chance to win,” she said. “I was nervous. I can’t believe that it’s happening. I won it last year but I thought there were so many fast girls that are running. I knew I had to run hard. I thought maybe (last year) was just a one-race thing.”
In the Varsity 2 race, Kate McCormick of St. John the Baptist snared the title with a time of 18:44.71. Sophomore Amanda Chambers and freshman Kathryn Terry of Colonie, N.Y., led their team to the title by taking second and third, respectively.
McCormick, who last week copped the Varsity A race at the Manhattan Invitational, utilized the patient approach.
“My strategy was to just hang back until the moment was right,” she said. “I hung back until right around when we got out of the woods (at 2.5 miles).”