After two weeks of Florida’s 2014 high school cross-country season, we’ve already seen quite a lot from the Panhandle athletes. I’d like to see a lot more, of course. I’m greedy that way.
Even though they’re figuratively just out of the gate, the top athletes in Northwest Florida have already had some fine performances, starting with defending state champion Sukhi Khosla. The Leon senior began by rolling through a controlled win at his team’s season opener, the Cougar Challenge in Tallahassee on 6 September. After that Khosla travelled north into Georgia, where he crushed the competition in the championship race at the Carrollton Orthopedic Clinic Invitational. winning by over 250 meters. Unchallenged, Khosla still ran a fraction of a second faster than he had the year before, clocking 15:53.35 on a historically tough Carrollton course.
During the 2014 track season Khosla lost only one race in Florida, an 800-meter run where he finished second to Avery Bartlett of Chiles. Bartlett went on to win the state title in that event. A senior this year, Bartlett opened his cross country season with a win at the 6 September Holloway Park Jamboree. A week later, he came within inches of catching Ocala Vanguard frosh Joey Fitzpatrick at the finish line of the Florida Horse Park Invitational, a race that Fitzpatrick won 16:01.67 to 16:01.77.
Fort Walton Beach junior Emma Rudman has to be considered a contender for the 2014 class 3A girls title. Fourth at last year’s state meet, Rudman came into the fall as a pre-season #2 in the FACA rankings. She opened her 2014 cross-country campaign with a 19:42.00 win at the Dolphin Dash in Panama City, helping the Vikings to a winning total of 33 points. Rudman and Fort Walton Beach should be back in action on 20 September at the North Port Invitational.
That’s a little bit of what we’ve seen. Now here’s something we haven’t seen.
When the DyeStat preseason national rankings came out, the Leon boys were listed 69th among the top 100 teams, and Chiles 88th--the only two Florida teams to make the list. Then the FACA class 3A state rankings were released, with Chiles first and Leon fourth.
So which of the two powerhouses is better? That’s something to be resolved at the races, and we haven’t seen that race yet. Leon opened with a 15-point win at the Cougar Invitational; the same day Chiles scored a 16-point win at the Holloway Park Jamboree, 250 miles away. The next week the teams were 400 miles apart, with Chiles winning the Florida Horse Park Invitational while Leon was placing second to preseason #87 Marietta at the Carrollton Invitational. For two schools that are barely ten miles apart, Chiles and Leon haven’t even come close to crossing paths. The teams are like two old west gunfighters, carefully arranging never to be in the same saloon together.
The showdown is inevitable, though. Even if the Lions and the Timberwolves managed to avoid each other at Bale ‘N’ Trail, Pre State, and the Panhandle Championships, they’re still destined to meet at District, and probably Region and State. Before the season is over, Chiles and Leon will have run against each other as often as any pair of teams.
We also haven’t seen either Khosla or Rudman tested this season. It’s coming, though. There’s still plenty of cross country left this fall. As the saying goes, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
Northwest Florida Correspondent Herb Wills
Herb Wills' running career goes back to the 1971 boys' age-group mile at the Florida Relays. Since losing that race he has won the 1976 Florida High School class 4A cross-country championship, 1979 AAU USA junior titles in cross-country and the 10,000 meters, and the 1989 TAC USA 30K national championship. As a distance runner at Florida State University from 1978 to 1982, he was NCAA All-American three times in track and once in cross country, and won a silver medal in the marathon at the 1981 World University Games. Graduating Florida State with a degree in mathematics, in the following years Wills ran in the USA Olympic Marathon Trials in 1984, 1988, and 1992, and placed tenth in the Boston Marathon in 1989. After more than a few years of duty as a hurdle setter and lane judge at track meets, Wills discovered that the public address announcer not only got to sit down at meets but was also sheltered from the rain. Since that revelation you can hear him with a microphone in his hand at several track and cross-country events in the Tallahassee area. Writing is another activity you can do while sitting down, and Wills has written about running for Racing South magazine and Tallahassee's local newspaper, the Tallahassee Democrat.
You can read more running related tidbits in his blog at http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/
SEE MORE OF HERB'S NORTHWEST FLORIDA REPORTS
