Pennslyvania Impresses All
By ELLIOTT DENMAN
Special to ArmoryTrack.com
photo by wingedfootfotos.com
NEW YORK, Oct. 13 - A record-breaking performance by Pennsylvanian Carly Seymour and a sizzling victory by New Jerseyan Brian Leung topped the list of achivements as the 35thedition of the New Balance Manhattan College Cross Country Invitational Meet was another smash success and again lived up to its subtitle - "the biggest and the best."
An amazing array of over 12,200 runnersfrom 422 schools, representing 147 American states, the District of Columbia, and one Canadian province, turned out in glorious mid-autumn weather to strut their stuff at historic Van Cortlandt Park with seniors Seymour of Central Cambria High and Leung of West Windsor-Plainsboro South setting the pace for all of them.
With her 13:55 triumph in the day’s top-feature event, the Girls Eastern States Championship,Seymour erased the 13:57.0 performance by Saratoga, NY’s Nicole Blood as both the all-time best at Vanny’s traditional 2.5-mile course and the Manhattan meet record.
Leung had high hopes of challenging the Vanny/Manahttan meet standard of 12:10.6 set by Fayetteville-Manlius, NY’s Tommy Guenwald last year but was more than content with a 12:18 victory that put him sixth on the all-time Vanny charts - one spot ahead of Olympian-to-be John Trautmann’s 12:18.7 for Monroe-Woodbury, NY in 1985.
Supported by the Armory Track Foundation and New Balance, the meet’s 37-race program began with the Sophomore Boys A Race at 9:15 a.m. and concluded with the Sr. Geraldine Bowes Girls Varsity F Race at precisely 3:49 p.m.
"Amazing just amazing," Armory Track Foundation president Dr. Norbert Sander called it all. The former Fordham University star and New York City Marathon champion who has been a driving force in The Big Apple’s renaissance as a national track and field capital, was one of the many saluting the organizing efforts of Ed Bowes, the former Manhattan College trackman and Bishop Loughlin High School coach, who has masterminded this event since its origin in 1973.
"We started organizing it about July 1st, with about 6-8 people, that’s my committee," said Bowes. "On the actual day of the meet, today, we had about 120 people working (although it looked like a lot more.)
"Never did I dream in 1973 when it began that it would ever grow to this size. All I wanted was a good local meet." Now, he can’t stop its steady growth.
"Everybody keeps coming back," he said. "That’s incredible. All our (2007 participation) numbers are records.
"We give out an incredible number of awards, over 4,200 trophies and medals, more than any other meet in the country.
"Number two, our entry fee is still very low, just $24 for a team of seven (compared to up to $140 for other national events.) That’s $24 across the board. I want schools to bring their whole teams, everybody (for the class races as well as the sub-varsity races, too), every kid, wherever that’s possible.
"Thirty-seven races, that’s incredible, and I may have to add more next year.
"We’ll run dawn to dusk ,if we have to, but that’s as far as we’ll go.
"But a two-day meet? No, never.
"And I’m getting older, too."
While the best running years for Bowes, now 65 - he starred at everything up to the marathon - are some four decades back, the futures of such runners as Seymour and Leung look totally lustrous.
"This is such an historic race, just think of all the great people who’ve run here before me," gushed Seymour. "I just can’t believe it, wow, that I’ve run faster than Nicole Blood. She and Aislinn Ryan (of Warwick, NY), they were my idols. I really take these things to heart.
"This is just a dream come true. It makes me so proud.
"I was pretty far behind at the beginning, I never seem to get out too well."
So she picked off her top rivals one by one.
"I guess I broke it open at the top of the crest, as we began to come back downhill, about there, a mile and a half," she said. "I was pretty focused. I’m training harder than ever now. I feel I’m in peak form right now. "I’m used to running hills back in Pennsylvania, so this course was great for me.
"I wasn’t even aware of the record coming in here. I just wanted to get ready for (the) Foot Locker (regionals.)" Penn State, Virginia and Michigan State are her leading college possibilities.
"I knew that (leading New Jersey rivals Doug Smith and Brandon Jarrett) weren’t in my race," said Leung, " but I still always felt it was ‘me against me. "I was similar to last week at Holmdel (the Shore Coaches Invitational), I had a pretty strong race, there, too. "Coming down the last straightaway, I kind of saw someone (Peter Dorrell of Blacksburg, Va.) coming up on me, and making a late surge. so I really started pumping, and it worked out well for me. "I was kind of surprised how fast my time was, though. "This was great weather, perfect conditions.
"My only goal right now is to stay ahead of Doug Smith (the Gill-St. Bernard School, NJ runner who took the Boys A section in 12:39.) (Along with Jarrett, the St. Benedict’s star, who dropped out with an injury.) "And then point to Foot Locker (regionals and nationals.)" Columbia University tops his list of potential college destinations, with other Ivies (such as Princeton, just one town over from West Windsor), and Georgetown and William and Mary getting strong consideration, too.
Kyle Merber, Half Hollow Hills West of Long Island, a 4:15 miler last track season,was another impressive victor, taking the Boys G race in 12:36. "Heading into the cowpath, I knew I had to be in the top three, or the top group, if I was going to place high," he said. "Then, when we got to the very top of the hill. I started pushing the pace and waiting for everyone else to start showing their weakness. Then I just took over on the downhills. I’m very confident in my finishes; I knew if I was in it with a mile to go that I could win it." Tops on his current college list: Virginia, Columbia, William and Mary, Georgtown, "and a few others."