Juggernaut Fashion

On Saturday, the Spartans went to Chaminade for the All-Catholic meet. They looked to continue a streak of dominance that includes the previous two year’s championships.

The day didn’t get off on the best foot with a disappointing performance by the 4x800 made up of Waller, Martini, McGann, and Seiler. Mother Nature gave them a good fight with cold and wind, but Senior Jacob Seiler knew that was no excuse for what he called a “bad day.” They bounced back right away by putting it behind them and knocking out some good 200s to be ready to get better the next time around. We had a sweet 200 marked off below the throws events with our Ancient Chinese wooden batons. And it had a banked turn.

Up next for the distance squad was Abernathy and Scherping in the mile. Abernathy was looking to defend his mile title from last year and Scherping was looking forward to running a mile with other people. Abernathy put the field behind him on the final lap and took the victory in 4:39. Scherping finished 3rd. He got out a little slow but had a huge closing lap—62! Abernathy did his real Daniels 200s after the race and then cooled down with friend of the Milk Table Krista who placed 2nd in the girl’s mile and 2 mile.

Scherping joined Potter for the 800 a little later. This was a race that Alex has been waiting for for a long time. He is the two time defending champion and was a little nervous about facing his teammate. The race played out just as he hoped. He led pretty much start to finish, running a 2:06. Scherping finished next. But, a late entry for Cardinal Ritter ran a 2:05 in the previous heat. Alex thought his 3-peat had been spoiled. He was upset about the 2nd place until we were giving out medals on Monday and Coach Russo announced that Potter had in fact won the race. Congrats on the 3-peat Potterman! Way to go!

Matt O’Connor and Michael Callahan ran the two mile at the end of the meet. They let the tough conditions get to them and had sub-par performances because of this.

DeSmet won the meet with a total of 163 points. This was 6 points fewer than last year, but the greatest margin of victory (95) we have had at All-Catholic. Here’s a link to the Creve Couer Patch’s coverage (story and pictures) of the meet Thanks to parents and all the guys who weren’t running that came out to support us!

Quote of the Day: “Take that Mrs. Neary!”- Coach Russo instructing me on what to do with our first place trophy. He said bring it in on Monday and say that as a slammed it on her desk. Apparently that’s what all DeSmet teams are supposed to do when they win something.

Joke of the Day: “Callahans, watch out.”- Coach Bergman. There was a hawk flying around in the sky that according to Coach Williams had actually swooped down and grabbed a rabbit earlier in the day.

Title: Those are the words Coach Russo used to describe the victory in Monday’s announcement.

You Gotta Believe!

Some the Spartans were in action at SLUH today. The guys who ran in the Hazelwood meet yesterday had a nice easy AE run. Those of us who were at CC Lake had a track workout.

Here is a meet Recap from SLUH:

Today the guys who didn’t run yesterday and won’t run on Saturday got to run in a meet at SLUH. The meet was originally scheduled as a home meet for De Smet but thanks to our fancy track we were not able to be here as it is acting up again. I for one think the track does not get enough attention so it acts out to get people to care about it but that is beyond the point. The meet started off with the 4x8 team running an impressive 3rd place finish against CBC’s varsity team and SLUH’s #2 JV team. Piatchek started the team off with a great 2:21 split followed by Presler with another great split at 2:22. Hapak followed that up with a 2:30 split then Billy the frosh finished with a 2:32 split. Great job guys! The next distance race was the mile. Goetz was the fastest on the De Smet team coming in 6th with a 5:10 time. Then Piatchek again with a 5:32, a PR! I finished about 8 seconds behind with a season PR of 5:40 and Hapak rounded out the JV race with a 5:55 impressive as he was battling an injury and racing about 40 minutes before the mile. In the freshman race Scott Meyer and Dan Rice both finished very well. Finally in the 2 mile the Spartans finished 3, 4, 5. Jimmy Reed finished in 3rd with 11:40 followed by Matt Beers at 11:42 then Patrick Callahan right on his tail with 11:45. That is the way to race boys! Good job all runners!

-Higgybaby

Scherping was back with us today and he was joined by Potter for an intense 800 workout that included a lot of fast 200s. I was by myself running the curse interval workout from last week. And the rest of the guys had a test effort day running 400s. For the most part it was another very good workout. We’re starting to look sharp and ready to run some fast times.

During stretching today it was time to honor a Milk Table tradition—the Birthday Splash! Celebrating was our very own Jacob “Padre the Sailor Man” Seiler. He turned 18 today and Potter got him with the water dump. There a few birthday gifts that can top that. Happy Birthday! Hope you get lots of Cake!

Quote of the Day: “Kevin, Looking smooth like Batman.”- Coach Traughber as I was coming through the start on one of my miles. It was some of the numerous words of encouragement that I got during my solo workout. I really appreciated all of it which came from both sprinters and distance guys; it kept me focus and motivated throughout. You guys rock!

Joke of the Day: “They’re in Bumville.”- Scherping’s response when I asked where were the bums, the workout group since they were done so fast.

Best Dressed: Potter. His new look grabbed a lot of attention today and that made it worth of Best Dressed honors. The new look? Taped wrists. Just like he was some kind of baseball or football player. Many people asked what is was for and the Milk Table has the answer. Alex wore the tape to help him keep his wrists steady while running fast. Above and beyond the wrists Potter also had on a super rare shirt. It was the “D” from a set of shirts spelling DESMET wore at the football semis. Potterman is the man! Tapped wrists for everyone tomorrow.

Title: It’s a catch phrase of Seiler’s and it’s his birthday. Not to mention that he did shout it as encouragement during the workout. And you just gotta believe.

Detour

Today was more or less a repeat of last Wednesday. We did trade Scherping for Michael Callahan for this week’s long run at Creve Coeur Lake. We ended up taking a very erratic path for the 70 minute run. But 70 minutes is 70 minutes no matter which way you go.

We stood out wherever went because it was Bright Clothes. It was a huge success; we had so much neon on: green, yellow, and salmon. This included our trip down the trail that leads from CC Lake to St. Charles. We messed around trying to come up with funny acronyms for random letter combinations.

In “Men for Others” spirit we cheered on a rower during the final 10 minutes of our run chanting “Row! Row! Row!” Amazingly, we were meet with hostility and angry. The rower proceeded to say what some of us considered to be the meanest thing we have ever heard while running. He commented on our shirts and called us a word that cannot be repeated on this family friendly blog. Needless to say no of us will ever be friends with a rower. Waller thought the terrible comment might have been because we smoked a crew team in a race during XC.

During stretching we were naming state capitals. It didn’t go quite as well as we had thought. Might need to study up so that we can get all of them next time. Have to get in back to our prime from 4th grade social studies. Our biggest misses were probably Alabama and Georgia.

Matt and Kevin defended their milk carton bball national championship defeating Waller and Callahan 2-1 on another O’Connor hock shoot.

Quote of the Day: “Cake.”- Seiler. This was the only word he said for about the first 3 minutes of the run. At this point Martini went on a crazy mid-run intervention that was hilarious. He screamed that Jacob would have to go through “6 to 8 weeks of intensive therapy” to stop his cake addiction.

Joke of the Day: Well, about 48 minutes into the run Nick who was stopping early because he was sick yesterday took Matt’s keys. He proceeded to get in his car and drive off. Matt started freaking out, but we just continued on with the run as if nothing happened. After a 10 minute mini loop we returned to the parking lot to find that Nick had also returned. Some of us were disappointed though since he didn’t bring McDonalds.

On an almost complete side note.
Because Kevin was unsuccessful finding a prom date last time at CC Lake and didn’t have any hope for this time, he decided to take prom into his own hands with the help of the team. On our way to the Lake we made a full team stop at a friend’s of Kevin. Unfortunately, she wasn’t home from school yet. So instead of leaving the prom sign and a note at her house, we came up with a better idea. Take a picture and ask her to prom on the Milk Table.
Sooo…….. Mallory……It’s May 6th by the way. Comment or Call!

Man Down

Well with Insignis behind us it’s time to get back to blogging. Coming up soon will be some back dated posts from last week. As for today, the squad was broken up into three different groups for the different meets going on this. Check back here to keep up on all the action this week.

To kill some time waiting for the juniors to return from projects, we played a little catch on the turf. A lot of people got in on it and we had a lot of fun for like 15 minutes. There’s nothing like a 4 man alley-oop double play.

We were missing a handful of guys today especially near the top. Some were retreating, one was sick, and another got unlucky over the weekend. This meant that the top and largest group today was cut in half for their workout. Matt O’Connor, John Waller, and Michael Callahan were up to the challenge.
They worked through the 800s on pace despite missing group leader and all-star pacer, Jacob Seiler. Also not there, but still at practice was Austin. He and the rest of the team had either a Mosley or Greaser AE run before they race on either Tuesday or Wednesday.

The three man workout team had an outstanding workout today. Their positive attitude and ability to control the workout were the keys to their success. O’Connor and Waller alternated lap leads on the 800, passing an imaginary baton. I guess whatever works.

I was doing a workout everyone else did about a week ago—the combination hill/track workout. It was a tough one. Mile pace 200s uphill and then mile pace 400s on the track. I battled a wall of wind coming up the hill but stayed just about on pace throughout. I was just really happy to be out there working hard and running fast. Looking forward to when I’m running the same workout as the rest of the guys.

Quote of the Day: “I have twelve more in me, coach.”- Matt O’Connor to T-bone after he asked if he had another 800 left in him.

Joke of the Day: “They both hate their lives.”- Coach Russo talking about the Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy. He doesn’t much like the Easter Bunny and was going off it. Hilarious. We were cracking up during core.

Best Dressed: Matt O’Connor. He was looking good today in the powder blue winter training shirt and blue short shorts. His attire lead Matt to an all-around great day of practice. He played a good center field, destroyed his workout, and topped it all off by getting Kevin back with an excellent cooler dump. Look good and good will follow.

Lake Party

Those of us who ran at Webster yesterday headed to Creve Coeur Lake for this week’s long run. There were six us (Abernathy, Martini, O’Connor, Scherping, Seiler, and Waller) and it was no T-bone, no rules.

This was a great practice right off the bat. Before we had even left DeSmet, Matt locked his keys in the trunk of his car. So he joined everyone not called Padre in the Pondering Man Van to carpool to CC Lake. We started off going left from the café. We meet up with Seiler who was getting a teeth check up at the soccer fields.

There was no one on the Ruggerfest fields so we decided to run right through the middle of them chasing all the birds that were just hanging out. It was pretty sweet. As we got out to the lake side, Matt and Kevin had a little routine they for every time we passed a girl. It involved talking loudly about Kevin’s lack of a prom date and wishing there was someone nearby that could be asked. We tried our best, but it didn’t work out.

For a good majority of the run, we just said MCC stereotypes. “I am [CBC, Vianney, Chaminade, SLUH, or DeSmet] and I [insert funny generalization typically related to running].” It was hilarious! We came up with some really good one for every school. The best one was from Martini and it made Joke of the Day.

When the 70 minute run finally came to an end, it was time for core. Jacob then found an orange in the field that became Coach. Whoever was holding Coach got to talk for coach. He encouraged us throughout core. We really like Orange Coach. We had a blast with him. Nick had a great line after Waller said something about how he couldn’t do anything. “Coach isn’t a vegetable; he’s a fruit!”

Because our run stopped at Jacob’s car at the soccer field, we loaded up and drove back to the café to get the milk and the Van. It was rave. Coach was hanging out the window. After drinking our delicious chocolate milk, we played the first ever milk cartoon bball national championship. Team Kabes- Lil OC got out to an early 2 point lead over Scherp-Wall who battled back to even the game at 2. Defense tightened up and it took several positions before O’Connor hit a hook shoot win the game. In celebration of the National Championship Abernathy got an ice dump from Martini.

The epic practice which Jacob called the “best of the season” ended with a sweet picture to commemorate the awesome day. Lucky a friend of Jacob had showed up to take it.
Quote of the Day: “Kevin, do you have a date for Prom?”- Matt O’Connor

Joke of the Day: “I AM DESMET. I SEND OUT ALL CAPS EMAILS.”- Nick Martini

Best Dressed: Scherping. All of us ran with our shirts tucked in to show off the classic flags shorts. Brian took the victory because of his now trademark bandana matched the Canadian Maple Leaf.

Grazing on a Cloudy Day

In preparation for the coming meets and time trial this week the Spartans set out for some easy miles to start off the week. For the top few groups this meant an ever classic Graeser loop during which the #1 Rule: No Fun, is typically broken into hundreds of pieces. With such a large group of guys some team members became reminiscent, of the infamous "Mega Group" which rose to power during the 2010 XC season.

Not letting the dreary weather dampen their spirits the runners pulled out all the stops for this run including an intense game of spotter in which Matt OC took home the Gold, GTTG ended poorly with unclear results due to lacking communication throughout the entire group, but the real highlight of the day's work was some quality practice time of the racing formations straight out of the play book and serving as training for young Austin. Also worth of acknowledgement was the potential addition to Martini's car construction collection in the form of an old nasty boom box stereo which he carried for the stretch down Ballas. All around it was a fun day.

Make sure to stay tuned for upcoming information from the meets this week with the Webster Groves Invitational tomorrow and the Freshman/Sophomore Northwest House Springs Relay meet on Wednesday! Also, the link for the entire season's meet schedule can be found at the bottom of the info bar on the right side of the page for those interested.

Joke of the Day: (Coach telling Brian about the sick workout he has planned for him this week) Kevin Chimes in, "Coach I wanna be an 800 runner! I never get cool workouts like Brian!" (Background noise comments, "My Name's Kevin, wah wah wah!") "Yeah! I wanna be a thrower!" - Nick Martini

Quote of the Day: "You can just fill one of these with hot water and put your foot in it. *Strange look from Kevin* Oh! i mean warm water. Gah! Cold Water!" - Coach trying to offer Kevin another way to ice his foot instead of full out ice bath

Best Dressed today goes to Mr. Brian Scherping With his "All Condition ready" Under Armor attire with the Nice DeSmet dri-fit T-Shirt but most notably complimented by his recent hair shortening surgery leaving him super fly for his 800m race tomorrow. Knucks Scherp.

-Padre

Breakfast Anyone?

The Spartans hit the track nice and early on this fine April morning for a tempo workout. The plan was to get some quality work in before a rest day on Sunday and a race on Tuesday or Wednesday. That’s exactly what happened.

Each group had a number of laps and a pace per lap to hit. Lots of encouragement could be heard from T-bone as guys called out splits as they passed. Lucky for him, Husmann came to practice and helped write down splits. Jack learned a valuable lesson – writing numbers on a clipboard is far more difficult than it appears. Back on the distance squad was Potter who had an 800 specific workout with Scherping. Aided by the early practice time, Potter picked up his first point in Potter vs. Food. It’s now 2-1. Everyone finished the workout with 4-6 200s at mile pace. The guys looked smooth today and coach was happy with the performance.

After practice, the guys who put in the miles in the off-season were invited over to the Traughber’s for a pancake breakfast. For starters we had the 2nd Annual DeSmet Distance Team Smoothie Contest. The competition expanded from 3 to 4 competitors – Potter (the only returner), Abernathy, Seiler, Callahan-Sullivan. Jacob’s speed was impressive, his “smoothie” (it was totally a milkshake but we let it go) was made the fastest. Abernathy added watermelon to his smoothie to try to set it apart from the others. Callahan-Sullivan struggled blending their thick and sweet smoothie, but it turned out alright. Potter forgot the lid for his blender which would have eliminated him from the competition had Coach Traughber (who said he did not “think” he wanted strawberries all over his walls) not let him borrow his.
After everyone there had plenty of samples of each smoothie, the voting took place. Abernathy, Potter, and Callahan-Sullivan were all tied with 4 votes apiece. There was still one vote not cast. Liz was torn and wanted to vote for two, but this contest needed a winner. After a final taste of Alex and Kevin’s smoothies, Liz chose Alex. After his disappointing showing last year, Potter is the Smoothie Champ.

With the excitement over, it was time to eat. And oh boy was it delicious. Pancakes, pancakes, and more pancakes, not to mention, eggs, sausage, and fruit. We ate and hung out and had a blast. Scherping, not to anyone’s amazement, ate the most. Justin Potter had the weirdest meal-chocolate chip pancakes covered in chocolate syrup. It induced what Liz called a “chocolate coma.” There’s just nothing like getting together as a team to celebrate lots of hard work.

Traughbers, thank you so much for your hospitality and wonderful food, we once again had a great time! Remember if want to be a part of the food and fun next year, get your miles in and you will get your invite.

Quote of the Day: “If I wasn’t mean to kids, I’d still be a DeSmet selling chocolate milk.”- Coach Traughber. We were telling Liz about how coach gives kids trouble when he’s selling milk.

Joke of the Day: “My favorite part of breakfast was the muffins. They were right next to the stove. What do you mean you didn’t see them?”- Seiler to Abernathy. Kevin went inside to find that there were never any muffins.