Ramblings by Steve Taylor...: Mt. SAC Relays (Day #2)- 3K Steeple and 10K Races

Race Day for...

Dana Guglielmo (FR)

Tim Quinn (JR)

and Levi Grandt (SO) in Los Angeles...

The barrier...

Dana know's it a little better than she really wanted to.

Our athletes took care of their prerace throughout the day while Lori and I caught up on our e-mail and phone mail...We started with Dana Guglielmo heading to the track at 5:00PM for her race, the 3K steeplechase.

Dana ran her first 3K steeple in 10:44 two weeks ago at the Colonial Relays, so this was an opportunity for her to see a more competitive field...and a much larger and deeper field of athletes. As we experienced in San Francisco three weeks ago, when the sun set the temperatures dropped to nearly perfect race conditions.

When the race started, Dana went to the front setting on the shoulder of the leader. The first 200M the runners do not hurdle any barriers…but as soon as they cross the finish line the first time through the 7 ½ lap race they encounter the barriers. The first barrier was fine…then the runners really bunched up and Dana had to scramble to cover the second barrier…As they approached the 3rd barrier a lot of shuffling was occurring. Dana’s steps were off and she had to literally stop and step over the barrier. Surprisingly it did not cost her much time or many places within the race. Then it got tricky for her. As she moved back up through the race she was on the inside rail as she approached the water barrier for the first time. As she tried to move out to have an open line into the water barrier an athlete from behind clipped her as she started to hurdle. That caused Dana to lose her balance and footing right in front of the water barrier…The result was her crashing at full speed into the barrier just in front of the water hazard.

Lori and I were watching and knew something happened but we didn’t know what. She went from being in 4th-5th place in a mass of 25 runners to literally disappearing. One moment she was there on the track and in a blink of an eye she vanished. It was strange…As the runners exited the water…Dana was nowhere to be seen. We were looking for her and after the last runner was 80-90 meters away from the pit we looked towards the water and saw Dana stand up from behind the barrier. She jumped into the water and took off after the pack that was now 100M away from her. She moved fast and started catching runners 2 laps later and eventually passed 4-5 athletes before the finish. Unfortunately, a personal best was not to be under the circumstance. She still ran 11:10, which is respectable…especially given the force she collided with the barrier. She has my respect for finishing after that…She is certainly a tough young woman. After the race her knees were scraped up…but she was more concerned with her chest and ribs from the collision. Today (Friday) she is doing fine…Just very stiff and sore.

The start of the women's 3K steeple...

Guglielmo in 2nd.

Dana after the fall...She lost 15 seconds on the 2nd lap.

...She continued to catch people throughout the race.

Dana's knees...but her ribs and chest took the impact.

Tim Quinn was a blur early in the 10K Invitational.

The next race was the Men’s 10K Invitational with Tim Quinn. He ran 30:24 here last year and was looking to improve upon that. The race went out on 29 flat pace with Quinn looking for 29:20-29:30 range. He looked fine through 2 miles but then it started to be more of an effort to hit the pace than it should have been. After opening in 4:41…followed by 4:42 for the 2nd mile…he ran 4:48, 4:56, 4:56 and 5:09 to close in 66.2 for the final 400M. His finish time of 30:17 is a personal best but I know he was looking to run much faster and put himself in position for the NCAA Super Regional Championships. Going into this weekend his time would rank him #56 on the NCAA DI National list.

Quinn’s Splits for the 10K:

73.3/70.3/68.5/69.3= 4:41 at 1 mile
69.5/70.4/70.3/71.9= 9:23.4 at 2 miles (4:42)
71.3/71.8/73.4/72.1= 14:11.8 at 3miles (4:48) (14:48.3 at 5K)
72.5/73.0/73.1/73.2= 19:05.1 at 4 miles (4:56)
73.4/73.0/75.3/74.3= 24:01.2 at 5 miles (4:56)
78.2/79.2/77.2/75.2= 29:11.5 at 6 miles (5:09)
66.2 for final 400m--30:17.5 for 10k...unofficially

Levi Grandt in 6th early in the 10K Open.

Our last race for Thursday night was Levi Grandt in the Open 10K scheduled to start at 10:00PM (PST)…which is 1:00AM for us East Coasters… Levi has been coming back off an injury that came on in Cross Country season. It was a strange quad issue that took a lot of time to mend. Ultimately, we redshirted him during the indoor season and have slowly brought him back into race form. He’s healthy now but a little behind were we would like him to be with his fitness. He’s coming a long though.

His started in the middle of the pack of 40 runners to start his race. Another very large field but it soon became single file and everyone hitting their splits. Levi came through the first mile in 4:49, flowed by a 4:53 to hit the 3200M in 9:42. From there he ran a 4:55 to cross the 3 mile point in 14:37 (15:12 at 5K)…followed by a 5:01, 5:05 and a 5:11 to hit 29:54 at 6 miles. He covered the last 400M in 75.2.

Levi’s Splits for the 10K Open

72.2/72.9/73.3/71.4= 4:49.6 at 1 mile
73.6/73.3/73.1/72.4= 9:42.5 at 2 miles (4:53)
73.8/74.1/73.1/73.1= 14:37.8 at 3 miles (4:55) (15:12.3 at 5K)
74.1/75.1/74.1/75.1= 19:38.2 at 4 miles (5:01)
75.1/75.1/76.1/76.2= 24:43.4 at 5 miles (5:05)
78.2/78.2/78.2/76.2= 29:54.9 at 6 miles (5:11)
75.2 for the last lap= 31:10.3 for 10K …unofficially

Dana Guglielmo, Tim Quinn and Levi Grandt

at Newport Beach, CA

After Dana, Tim and Levi raced in the Thursday night races we headed to Newport Beach on Friday so they could get in a run in the sun. According to Wikipedia: “As of February 2010 Portfolio.com ranked Newport Beach, California the richest U.S. city. The city's median family income and property values consistently place high in national rankings making Newport Beach one of the wealthiest communities in California, and in United States overall. The Daily Pilot, Costa Mesa, CA a neighboring city newspaper reported more than a quarter households have an income greater than $200,000, and the median value for homes exceeds $1 million.”