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Central won, SH lost...can't it be left at that? There's no need to expect the SH fans to come on here and say anything if that's what this thread was looking for. SH won by wide margins the first two times these teams met, so I wouldn't say one is better than the other based on one game. There's no need to hate on Omar or the Toppers. Both teams are legit and will do well down the road. BTW, Omar didn't look like he was faking anything...why would he care about getting fan support anyways? He's there to play a game, not get the fans into it. As for the G-E-D comment, SHHS is recognized as one of the top academic schools in East TN, regardless of athletics. During an interview the other day, the interviewer said it was regarded at the collegiate ranks as one of the best schools in the state. That may or may not be true, but don't hate on the academics. I think it would be hard to find 1200 students, or half the school population, at SHHS who are going to be jailed. SH has three national merit scholar finalists this year, which is very, very rare. Yes, "act scores" may have been a dumb chant, but both sides were guilty of those. A kid from another team said he would hear "Central Cougars" in his sleep the crowd chanted it sooo much. Best of luck to both teams next week...it would be another fun game to watch if a rematch took place.

did michael forney play? he wasn't in the box score?

thanks man, good luck with your injury too. yeh, i definitely won't be doing 100 miles a week in the season since track races are shorter than cross, but i'd like to get up there for that 8k. good luck to everyone.

Jaynes: Let your running do the talking, and don't brag about how you are going to beat people badly, whether in your division or not. If you do the training, just go out there with respect and show everyone what you can do. It's that simple. Also, my mile will be much improved since I was iron deficient these past 2 seasons (thus the debacle the last month of track in workouts and short races plus the fast freshman mile but not much improvement the past 2 years). My speed is much better now than before, but of course the mile will not be my focus. You may beat me and I wish you the best. Just go out there and run the races, though. We'll all applaud your efforts, but most of these guys won't like you saying that you are going to whip them. On another note, I am still not able to run with the foot injury, but my plan is to hopefully get up to 90-100 miles a week as soon as possible in preparation for the US Junior 8k race in February (getting top 6 and qualifying this year may be out of the cards as Bumbalough, Macnamara, Bethke, Acosta, etc. will all be there, but there's always next year!). I love the 8k and 10k so much, as my whole family (myself included) has no footspeed. I'll run big, out-of-town meets for the two-mile, and I'll look forward to Jaynes helping me get faster in the mile in local meets. I probably still will never be able to break 2:05 in the 800, but that's okay. All those guys mentioned, though, have a chance to go below 9:15 in the deuce, and some I know are shooting for sub-9 and elite times nationally. TN is on the rise, and I hope JJ will be able to help the state rise even higher in the mid-distance. Heck, the whole country seems to be on the rise as guys aren't afraid to do what worked so well in the 60's and 70's--over 100 miles a week and running fast (although Nelson and his 140 miles a week and Lindgren's 200+ is just crazy). Well, it's bed time. Good luck to all in winter training!

she's unbelievable...if she goes to FL South, she should def. qualify for nat's. some young girls mature and slow down, so we'll have to wait and see how she develops, but at this rate she could go down as the best TN girl ever (i.e. bumbi for girls).

she's unbelievable...if she goes to FL South, she should def. qualify for nat's. some young girls mature and slow down, so we'll have to wait and see how she develops, but at this rate she could go down as the best TN girl ever (i.e. bumbi for girls).

thanks man...i still want to go down there and win the thing. i have been able to run pretty much pain-free these last 2 days and feel like i will be back to full health soon. good luck to everyone this saturday!

thanks...i look at it the same way.

not running harldy at all for a couple weeks and going from 14 miles a day to zilch is going to make me continue to improve like your teammate? i'm taking a different route than normal and do not have the opportunity to try and peak with training. i'm not trying to make excuses though. other runners have gone through and are going through things ten times worse than this. look at ryan sheridan (a soph who made it to FL Nat's then couldn't run for a year with internal problems and injuries). believe me, i'm gonna go all out. look at the physiological aspects and adaptations lost after just 7-10 days off and it stinks, but those are if you are not exercising at all and i have been on the elliptical and the bike (so you're right there). but, simply running through pain (and being able to run and do workouts) is a lot different than not being able to run. tendonitis is not the same in different areas. some tendonitis you can run through and still do well and not run with a different gait. do your research on anterior tibial tendonitis...it can knock guys out for half a year or more and can ruin your career if you take it lightly. you can't run normally because each time your foot hits the ground it hurts and shakes. if you run through too much pain, the next step is a stress fracture. when i ran that 15:16 though, it was off a 93 mile week and lower iron. I wish i could have had taken the next step (speed and taper) with a period of good speedwork, but I do trust my fitness and will not use this as an excuse. it's been a good season and i hope it gets better. just because my name is todd or whatever you said does not mean that i'm invincible and can take a couple weeks off and still run the same. are you saying if i had a stress fracture or mono i'd have no excuse to slow down? i don't get it. i will say that i've been fortunate to be able to run a few times in the past couple of weeks and been able to cross train without pain for 2 hours or so a day. however you look at it, though, everyone was 45-50 seconds closer to me than usual on thursday and i should have been under 15. i will have to run much better next week if i want to do well. FL is iffy right now...i will only run if i can get back to training this week. good luck to you as well next week...you guys can take it all and i'm rooting for you.

thanks for the confidence, but i've missed two weeks with tendonitis and have run sparingly...yesterday was painful and my first goal is to get healthy for state and FL...yes, it's my senior year and my last shot (and my first shot with my iron up) at state and FL, but this type of injury can last a long time if not corrected. i would have loved to seen what i could do off three weeks of good training before state (esp. dropping from 90 per week to much less) so it stinks--but oh well, nothing i can do about it. good luck to all next week!

How long has Coach Harper coached BA?

yes, it is. 4:54 i think, but a 2:01 800 split in a relay.

as of now (for track and x-c), you'd be hard-pressed to pick any team other than Houston...but they will be down next year losing 6 of their top 7 distance guys. never count them out though.

hopefully you e-town guys, michael, and everyone will have better luck today. I learned a good lesson that it's not always wise to only put one fast 2-mile race on your schedule before sectionals/state. About everything that could go wrong went wrong. They called off the two-mile last night when torrential rains started nailing the track and said we had to be back at 7:30 AM the following morning, and we hadn't made reservations or planned on staying the night living only 2 hours away. Then, the weather goes cold and the wind picks up like crazy this morning, and lane 1 had to be the only lane that had standing water and puddles. Nevertheless, we were all looking forward to a fast race, but 200m into the race my shoe gets stepped on at exactly the wrong time and "there she goes" (starting on the outside didn't help). Talk about no fun---running uneven in the cool weather and bad wind and puddles with one shoe on, one shoe off is officially no fun and painful. I couldn't get my other shoe off so decided to live with it and just stink it up and run the race. Unfortunately, nobody was willing to take it out in the low 4:40's like I hoped, but thankfully Stephen Hill took over and did the work for the rest of us through a 4:48 first mile. I tucked in and stayed in 2nd on Stephen's shoulder for the first 7 laps but got passed by a few guys on the last lap. I'll take the blame for losing some of my concentration and only thinking "foot, foot, balance, sore, blister, etc." as I let myself forget to push it like I should have. I finished with way too much left in the tank and really feel like my one big race of the season was a waste. I should have pushed the middle laps but was tentative to take the lead in the bad conditions and my heel was killing me (must be a heel striker ). The pace and tactics were just too slow for a good time like sub 9:30 and the wind and wetness didn't help. Heck, I built my whole season schedule around this race like many others did and it just kinda stinks after training so much for this race looking to run a big PR. Oh well, it's a good story for the future. Patience is a virtue and "what if's" are useless. Maybe next year's VTC will be blessed with real late April weather. Good luck to everyone and I'm looking forward to hear about how you all did. I think Josh Jaynes might break out in the mile today...

maybe so, but that gas was leaving him pretty quick 5 mintues later as he could not stop puking. it was pretty gnarly and admirable at the same time. great job zach.