Working at the Car Wash

In the immortal words of Rose Royce:
"You might not ever get rich
But let me tell you it's better than digging a ditch"

Well, that, and you will be able to earn some money toward the purchase of a team jacket.

Remember to spread the word about our car wash on Sunday, September 1, from 9am to 3pm at the Hess station on Empire Blvd.  We are responsible for bringing buckets, rags, sponges, etc.

Monroe County Boys XC - Preseason Top Individuals...

Now a look at the top individual boys in Monroe County, based on last year's XC performances.  I have also included this year's outdoor times for those that were ranked in the top 50 in Monroe County this past spring in the 3200 or 1600, or broke 11:10 in the Steeplechase.

It looks like Mickey Burke should dominate, with a clear top tier of four other runners, followed by a large contingent of top ten possibilities.

The leading candidates for first-team All-County...

Rank	Name	School	Track Times
1	Burke, Mickey	Rush Henrietta	9:02, 4:24
2	Ranke, Tyler	Hilton	9:19, 4:20, 9:15
3	Dyrland, Josh	Irondequoit	9:21, 4:24, 10:18
4	Ronchetti, Will	Brighton	9:19, 4:16
5	Wesley, Jack	Mendon	4:21
6	Yost, Nathan	Victor	10:14
7	Johnson, Keith	Thomas	9:57, 4:43
8	White, Jimmy	Fairport	10:02, 10:11
9	Mertens, George	Victor	9:53, 4:32
10	Shanahan, Luke	Victor	9:53, 4:38, 10:25
11	Northrup, Brian	Arcadia	9:55, 4:27
12	Goldstein, Josh	Thomas	9:58, 4:36
13	Neamtu, Nick	Thomas	10:21, 4:27
14	Green, Connor	Mendon	9:59, 4:33, 10:29
15	Demmer, Ty	Batavia	9:53, 4:40, 11:00
16	Hatta, Olivier	Fairport	9:57
17	Witt, Kevin	Thomas	10:19, 10:33
18	Kozlowski, Mike	Penfield	9:58, 4:36, 10:12
19	Looby, John	Irondequoit
20	Hanns, Jacob	East Rochester
21	Whitman, Ben	Thomas	10:11, 10:46
22	Doyle, Nathan	Mendon
23	Sargeant, Seamus	Fairport	4:43
24	Kaukeinen, Britt	Irondequoit	10:08, 4:35
25	Azzara, David	Mendon	10:11, 10:56
26	Dooley, Kevin	Mendon	10:11, 4:41
27	Schmitt, Drew	Brighton	10:31
28	Feigal, Evan	Mendon
29	Simpson, Zachary	Brighton	10:10, 4:43
30	Huot, Marco	Sutherland
31	Peffley, Chris	Thomas
32	Geraci, Matt	Honeoye Falls Lima	9:59
33	Buri, Josh	Hilton	10:54
34	Vestri, Justin	Thomas	10:21

And some other contenders...

35	Wright, Rob	Hilton	10:14
37	Feigel, Evan	Mendon	10:13
43	Lyons, Zach	Schroeder	10:21
46	Shelton, Ben	Irondequoit	10:15
47	Kolankiewicz, Thomas	Athena	10:09
49	Vodacek, Mason	Brighton	10:15, 4:40
67	Glavin, Donovan	Hilton	10:11
72	Goodman, Isaac	Mendon	4:41
74	Gaffney, Bobby	Sutherland	4:41
90	Hess, Griffin	Mendon	4:41
96	Michaels, Noah	Fairport	10:13
122	Gillooly, Jack	Penfield	4:40

Monroe County Girls XC - Preseason Top Individuals

So, now it is time to look at the individuals to watch during this upcoming season, and today we will start with the girls.  All the usual caveats apply: I only look at last year's XC performance, and do not make adjustments for track; this will miss all new runners that did not make the radar last year, whether it was because they did not compete at the high school level, or competed for a non-Monroe County school (e.g expect Mary Barger to jump into the top five as she transfers to Mendon); etc.

Since there are 34 runners named to the All County first-team, that is the number of girls in the first list below.

Rank	Name	School	Track Times
1	Lembo, Katie	Penfield	9:42, 4:33
2	Jensen, Kennedy	Canandaigua	10:08, 4:46
3	Quinn, Siobhan	Rush Henrietta	10:09, 4:44
4	Paratore, Amanda	Schroeder	10:28, 5:05
5	Douglas, Riley	Honeoye Falls Lima	10:55, 5:09, 7:51
6	Albrecht, Autumn	Brockport	10:26, 4:49, 7:39
7	Visca, Mary	Sutherland	10:25, 4:51
8	Mevorach, Martha	Honeoye Falls Lima	10:31, 5:03
9	Cooper, Alex	Rush Henrietta	10:13, 4:48
10	Sedita, Megan	Penfield	10:50, 5:00
11	Yancey, Colleen	Mendon	10:36, 4:58, 7:34
12	Camillaci, Zoe	Hilton
13	Garbinski, Dana	Canandaigua
14	Cok, Sarah	Penfield
15	Peters, Lexi	Rush Henrietta
16	Adams, Laura	Thomas	5:06, 7:47
17	Pieper, Maddy	Mendon	11:21, 5:14
18	Leo, Trista	Penfield	10:36, 4:55
19	Palmeri, Amanda	Hilton
20	Pieper, Lilly	Mendon	11:40, 5:05
21	Jones, Rachael	Fairport	11:40, 5:02, 8:25
22	Kunigan, Mary	Hilton	11:23, 7:51
23	Wagner, Clara	Irondequoit	8:04
24	Campbell, Alexa	Brighton	11:02, 5:05, 7:41
25	Sedita, Erin	Fairport	10:59, 4:53
26	Fahrenholz, Tory	Penfield	11:00, 7:43
27	Gnolek, Sara	Thomas
28	Watson, Sammy	Rush Henrietta
29	Wojnowski, Veronica	East Irondequoit
30	Bucci, Loryn	Fairport
31	McDaniel, Sydney	Honeoye Falls Lima
32	Glitch, Kristina	Rush Henrietta	11:24, 5:15, 8:07
33	Fitzgerald, Natalie	Schroeder	11:21, 5:13
34	Fries, Aly	Victor

Some other girls were ranked lower but had track performances that place them in reach of this list:

38	Erickson, Kate	Victor	7:58
41	Kindig, Alexis	Batavia	5:10
43	Wojnowski, Stephanie	East Irondequoit	8:12
46	Tuite, Kari	Mendon	11:06, 8:01
47	Mulroy, Casey	Sutherland	8:13
51	Wiseman, Julia	Schroeder	5:13, 8:02
52	Glavin, Shauna	Hilton	11:26
54	Conner, Christian	Fairport	11:33, 5:14
56	Zeccola, Amanda	Mendon	5:08
60	Smith, Rachel	Sutherland	8:05
61	Mechler, Brittany	Thomas	11:21
62	Watson, Ceara	Rush Henrietta	5:09
64	Angus, McKenzie	Penfield	8:09
99	Daughton, Sage	Penfield	11:32
110	Ludington, Claire	Schroeder	11:26, 5:13
147	Palermo, Emma	Irondequoit	11:16

Monroe County Boys XC - Preseason Team View

Wow, time sure flies.  Between all of the bonus little league baseball games I've been able to watch, and several trips to the Buffalo area, my non-working hours have been quite full and have prevented more posting.  I've had the Boys Preseason team forecast available for a bit, but haven't had time to post with some comments.

Anyway, both TullyRunners and now MileSplit have weighed in with their 2013 preseason view, so here is my view added to the mix:

1	Thomas	70
2	Mendon	92
3	Fairport	121
4	Brighton	159
5	Hilton	191
6	Irondequoit	194
7	Arcadia	197
8	Victor	216
9	Sutherland	272
10	Rush Henrietta	276
11	Penfield	307
12	Honeoye Falls Lima	335
13	Schroeder	340
14	Canandaigua	357
15	Batavia	437
16	Churchville Chili	476
17	East Rochester	489
18	Athena	495
19	Gates Chili	515
20	Spencerport	545
21	Brockport	566
22	Odyssey	582
23	Olympia	636
24	East Irondequoit	637

It's very strange to see some of these preseason rankings.  R-H 10th, even with Mickey Burke returning as one of the very top runners in the state?  HF-L 12th, despite showing that they can develop new runners year after year?  ER 17th, ahead of a bunch of much larger schools, including an Athena team that was quite solid last year?

Other parts of the ranking are not surprising at all.  The current group of Thomas seniors were already making a big impact as sophomores and it always looked like this could be their year.  Schroeder lost a boatload of seniors last year, including all but our 5th fastest runner at Counties.  And Victor, despite having three runners that should be up near the front of most races (could go 1-2-3 against at least 16 other schools in league meets), drops off a great deal to runners four and then five, falling to eighth in the preseason numbers.

What did the other prognosticators say?  MileSplit looks at the Section V Boys in Class A and B this way:

Class A

7. Thomas

10. Fairport

15t. Irondequoit

17. Hilton

28. Rush-Henrietta

Class B

2. Mendon

9. Brighton

10. HF-L

24. Sutherland

It looks like they are overlooking Victor in Class A and Arcadia in Class B, and  have great expectations of HF-L retooling.

TullyRunners makes the following forecast:

Overall

9t. Thomas (6th in Class A)

11. Mendon (2nd in Class B)

20t. Fairport (10th in A)

25. Irondequoit (14th in A)

Brighton (8th in B)

Hilton (20th in A)

Arcaida (10th in B)

HF-L (13th in B)

The main differences in the other forecasts and mine seems to be that they expect Irondequoit to solve their 5th man problem (45 second gap at Counties and 53 seconds at McQuaid between their 4th and 5th fastest returning runners), and the others believe HF-L will find some runners (only 7 returning runners have data that I have recorded - but a healthy Tyler Urckfitz could save them a boatload of points), and they don't believe that Victor can get help for their big 3 (all capable of top 10 at Counties).

Monroe County Girls XC - Preseason Team View

TullyRunners just posted their preseason look at the XC teams around New York State, and since our XC camp started this week, it seemed like a good time to take a look ahead at the Monroe County 2013 XC season.  Today we will be looking at the girls, from a team perspective.

Canandaigua certainly suffered the greatest loss to graduation, losing 3 girls ranked in the top 31 in Monroe County last year, and they did not have as much depth as some of the other teams.  Thomas lost 3 of the top 57, including Eileen, but they had a number of girls not far behind.  Mendon lost 3 of the top 63, but not only did they have decent depth, they also had an off-season transfer: Mary Barger, one of the top F-M runners from last year has moved to their part of the Pittsford school district.  Irondequoit loses their 1-2 punch that made them competitive in many meets last year.  R-H also loses two top runners, and we lost Val and Katie from the top of the Varsity ranks.

Ignoring the shuffling that happened during track season, here is what the returning team scores look like at this time:

1	Penfield	70
2	Rush Henrietta	79
3	Mendon	106
4	Honeoye Falls Lima	128
5	Fairport	154
6	Hilton	163
7	Thomas	199
8	Schroeder	221
9	Canandaigua	245
10	Victor	271
11	Sutherland	280
12	Brighton	307
13	Batavia	344
14	Irondequoit	406
15	East Irondequoit	431
16	Brockport	485
17	Gates Chili	498
18	Spencerport	539
19	Odyssey	560
20	Athena	563
21	Churchville Chili	580
22	Arcadia	623
23	East Rochester	inc
24	Olympia	inc

So, we start out in the 8th spot, with quality teams just behind us (Canandaigua, Victor and Sutherland), and many of our usual nemesis just ahead of us (Thomas, Hilton and Fairport).

TullyRunners sees things a fair amount differently, for the state-wide rankings they have:

7. Penfield 400

17. Mendon 495

22t. Rush-Henrietta 550

22t. Honeoye Falls-Lima 550

27. Hilton 560

Among Class A, they have Hilton 11th and Fairport 23rd.  I think that is more of a tip of the hat to Hilton's past performance than a reflection of where the two teams stand based on last year's results.  And at the top, I expect a very tight battle (again) between Penfield (5th on Tully) and R-H (9th).

In Class B, I expect HF-L (13th on Tully) to provide a strong challenge to Mendon (9th).

All the Cool Kids Were There

The Webster Distance Runners camp opened with a very nice turnout yesterday.  If you were not able to attend, new campers are still welcome for the remaining sessions.

The heat threatened to postpone opening day - as of 4:05pm, the "Real Feel" temperature was still 100 degrees, but it dropped to 94 by 5:10pm and we were good to go, although with scaled-back intensity.

Yesterday's clinic covered safety, so this included timely information on some signs of heat illness, in addition to the good practices usually discussed, such as running facing traffic, ideally on roads with wider shoulders and lower speed limits, and making sure that someone knows your planned route, especially if you are running alone.

Camp Starts Today!

So, the off-season has now ended for me.  While most of the team has been faithfully attending Captains' practices, I have been limited to parenting duties, but today I return to coaching.

Today is especially exciting as camp opens under a new umbrella: Webster Distance Runners is now an official USATF running club and will be the group that administers and conducts the summer running camp.  Coach Brust and I will run the camp in much the same fashion as in past years.  Val has volunteered to be an assistant coach for the camp, and we quite excited by this addition (I am still searching for additional volunteers, if any readers are interested).  I also expect to have at least one guest coach make an appearance to provide a different perspective on the sport.

I'm looking forward to seeing the 2013 XC team at Webster Park by 5:30 this afternoon!