Forty-thousand strong yelled, screamed and cheered in Philadelphia over the weekend at Franklin Field for the Penn Relays. Runners from schools like Wisconsin, Tennessee and Penn State lined up with Iolas own Allen Community College Red Devils in one of the most prestigous track meets in America.
Allen sent a 4xMile and a 4×800 team to the meet over the weekend and while the weather kept the Red Devils from really making a statement on a national stage, they did show that they had the athletes to compete with anyone in the country.
The 4xMile struggled with the wind, finishing 13th out of the 13 schools competing with a time of 17:34.53, nine seconds behind 12th place New Hampshire.
I dont think we ran great but I dont think we ran poorly, head coach Vince DeGrado said. I didnt want us to go if we were going to get blown out of the water and I think we were competitive. The weather kind of flipped on us because it was supposed to be really nice but then a storm blew in and it rained all Friday and then Saturday, we were dealing with 25-30 mph winds.
Another thing that stood out to DeGrado was the caliber of the athletes in the relays. The Red Devils have really good runners who will go on to be strong runners at mid-major schools next season. But schools like Wisconsin and Indiana have some of the best of the best.
It was kind of humbling, DeGrado said. Theres a difference between mid-major/power five level runners which I think we have and solid power five guys or even the elite college guys. We dont see that level of athlete at your standard junior college meet. It was eye-opening.
DeGrado said there was a slight panic when they realized how soon the 4×800 was going to be run after the 4xMile. DeGrado managed to get the Red Devils pushed back to a later heat. Even so, runners Joshua Doria, Yoel Yoel and Joshua Clethen, had only a little more than 10 minutes to recover before their next race started. Mitchell Dervin was the fourth 4xMile runner.
The Red Devils finished 19th out of 23 teams with a time of 8:01.77 in the 4×800 relay. Xari Barros, the slowest runner on the team, ran the fastest leg of the four making DeGrado wonder what might have been if his guys had received adequate rest between races.
They ran that 4×800 literally 15 minutes after the first race, DeGrado said. And in those windy conditions, thats tough. I praise them. They competed their butts off. I take solace knowing that had we been fresh, we wouldve finished much higher, easily.
MEANWHILE, assistant coach Dwight Davis took the sprinters and the jumpers to the Southwestern Relays in Winfield where the Red Devils were able to get top three finishes by Jarquel Richardson-Frazier (10.70) and Rashion Walker (10.82) who took first and second in the 100.
Rashion Walker won the 200 (21.61) and Jason Axon took second in the 400 (49.82).
Jeremiah Revere took first in the 400-meter hurdles with a time of 55.04 and the 4×400 team of Axon, Robin Anderson, Revere, and Walker won with a time of 3:18.49.
ACC started competing in the Region VI Outdoor Championships in El Dorado on Friday and that competition will continue into today.
Right now were sitting third in the conference, DeGrado said. But I like what we have going on right now. Compared to where we wer a year ago, thats huge. Im excited to see what we can do in the last two weeks of the season.
