All My Friends Are Runners: The DMR Debuts

Chapter 8: The DMR Debuts

The coolest event in track and field has to be the Distance Medley Relay. The race is made up of four legs: a 1200 meter lead off leg, followed by a 400 meter leg, an 800 meter leg and then the 1600 meter anchor leg. On a traditional outdoor track, it’s a 3-1-2-4 in terms of laps. It’s a perfect combination of all the elements that go into distance running: speed, endurance and heart.

I instantly became enamored with the 1200m leg. There was such a mystery to it. The 1200m is not a traditional event and with over 10 years of running experience currently under my belt, I have never seen an open 1200m contested. I’m not sure I’ve ever even done a rep in a workout that was exactly 1200m, it is usually just 1ks or miles. The 1200m is reserved exclusively for the DMR[1].  

In 2007, the PTFCA added the DMR to the list of events to be contested at the indoor state championships alongside the 4x800m relay. No team would be allowed to run both a DMR and 4x8, and only the top 10 fastest submitted times would be accepted into the event at the state championships. It added an intriguing subplot to the season. Which relay would each team choose? What time was fast enough to qualify you for states? And most importantly, who would win the first title?

The top seed coming into the state championship was our rivals, Wissahickon. The same top three that Wissahickon tried to use to steal a dual meet against us were the three key distance legs for their DMR: Teddy Miller, Nick Crits, and Scott Kern. They also added a dangerous weapon at the 400m leg, Kevin Bray, who was one of the top quarter milers in the conference. The Wissahickon boys popped off a 10:31 in early January and then sat back, not matching the bombshell they dropped earlier in the year.

Meanwhile, other teams were quickly gaining ground. The boys from West Chester Henderson won the Meet of Champions DMR in 10:38, defeating Boyertown and their All-Star anchor Jason Weller as well as the Cardinals of Upper Dublin. Germantown Friends, an independent league school, had some solid performances, including a victory by Junior Max Kaulbach in the mile at Meet of Champions. Coatesville, despite the absence of the Dawson twins who swam in the winter, was hovering around state title discussion as were 2005 XC state champions West Chester East.

Henderson and Wissahickon, the two clear top seeds, decided on opposite philosophies for the state championships. Henderson, who had hopes of grabbing a team title, decided to enter Chris Aldrich, Chris Ferry and Tim Shea, three members of their DMR, in open events to give themselves maximum point opportunities. Meanwhile, only the 400m runner Kevin Bray would be pulling double duty for Wissahickon. Other top seeds, like Upper Dublin and GFS, entered completely fresh relays to try and maximize their chances at winning. With so many fresh teams chomping at their heels, Henderson was taking a sizable risk[2].

Little did Henderson know their decision would take them on an emotional rollercoaster the next day at Penn State. First, Chris Aldrich, the team’s anchor leg, wakes up feeling under the weather. Despite that fact, he raced the mile anyway (it’s a no scratch meet, so he has to run or they lose him from the DMR) and ended up having a very strong day, placing 4^th and giving the team 5 quick points to start the day[3]. Aldrich would have time to refuel before the DMR, but his questionable health would likely make for a scary anchor leg.

Then, in a pleasant surprise, Henderson watched their senior leader in the 400m, Tim Shea, PR in the first and slowest heat, with a time of 50.29. Suddenly, he had a realistic shot at sneaking a point or two for the team. Then, unexpectedly, things got chippy in the fast section, resulting in a rocky run for many of the favorites, including multi-time state champion Khaliff Featherstone. Tim Shea ended up 4^th place overall for Henderson, giving them another 5 points.

Chris Ferry, who boasted a season best of 1:55 at the slow, rubber track of Glenn Mills, lined up for the 800m, knowing his teammates had delivered strong scoring performances already. He was the 2^nd seed in the race behind only Andrew Rotz of Central Dauphin. But in the ultracompetitive 800m field, Ferry couldn’t quite keep pace with the leaders and faded to 6^th overall by the race’s conclusion, giving Henderson only 3 additional points and 13 total. As Henderson watched Boyertown’s Jason Weller add 10 more points to his team’s score in the 3k, the Warriors knew they needed a win in the DMR to have any shot at being a top 5 team in the meet.

After his disappointing finish in the 800m, Chris Ferry was determined to redeem himself. However, it would not be on the 1200m leg, the position he had trained for all season, but instead on the anchor leg. Aldrich sickness was deemed enough of a liability to warrant a swap between the first and last legs for Henderson. While Ferry had proven in the past he was a strong miler (he qualified for the state finals in 2006 in the 1600m and placed 11^th at the state championships in cross country), he had been racing the shorter distances all season.

Meanwhile, from my perspective, Wissahickon had their own surprise. I had always assumed Wissahickon would choose to anchor Teddy Miller, their XC State Medalist and strong 3200m man and use Crits’s speed for the 1200m lead off leg. However, Wissahickon understood the importance of running your best runner last and letting him chase, even if it meant sacrificing a little bit of speed on the front end. It proved to be a brilliant decision, as Nick Crits was about to have the best race of his career.

After the 4x800m concluded, Teddy Miller and Chris Aldrich joined the other 1200m lead off legs on the starting line. Aldrich worked his way to the lead and pulled away over the final stretch to get the stick to Shea with a lead. That got Henderson clear of the pack and allowed them to open up an advantage for their anchor leg. Giving chase was Germantown Friends, who had junior Jake McKenzie on lead off duties. Miller handed off roughly 3 seconds back from the leaders for Wissahickon.

Shea and 800 meter runner Andrew Jervis got Henderson out to a fairly sizeable lead, perhaps a 3 second advantage on Germantown Friends. CB South[4], Wissahickon and Upper Dublin were also near the front. Boyertown, who had the seemingly invincible Jason Weller on the anchor, looked like they might be too far back for the tired legs of their superstar to carry them to victory.

In unfamiliar territory, Chris Ferry began his anchor trot. He had a sizeable lead and just wanted to hold on. He had to be feeling that open 800 in his legs and it didn’t help that his closest three pursuers were running on fresh legs. But Ferry hung tough out the gates. The pursuers behind him started fast, but so did he and the distance between 1^st and 2^nd stayed about the same. But Ferry was running alone while the guys behind him had each other. So eventually, he got caught.

Kaulbach was the man to do it, pushing in the pace on the third quarter and making an honest charge for the leader. With 200 meters to go, Kaulbach and Ferry were shoulder to shoulder. Crits for Wissahickon ran in third and then Joe Dorris for Upper Dublin hung as best he could to fourth. As Kaulbach tried to make a pass for the lead, Ferry fought him off and tried to open up his stride. Then, Crits made a huge move down the back stretch, going for the win. He moved into second and drafted in Ferry’s wake into the final turn of the race. But here, Ferry was not to be denied. He sling-shot off the turn and sprinted away from Crits to win the state title for Henderson in a time of 10:21. Ferry anchored home in about 4:19 to hold off a 4:16 anchor split from Crits.

A few weeks later, Henderson’s DMR was healthy and recovered. They returned to their original order with Ferry on the lead off and Aldrich on the anchor. The state title already in hand, they set their sights on a national championship at the Nike Indoor National meet. With Ferry now leading the charge, the strategy for Henderson was the same. Chris got out hard and blasted to the lead with a 3:08.0 split for 1200, a few seconds faster than Aldrich’s time at states. Tim Shea added a 49.9 and then Andrew Jervis held steady with a 2:01 carry, giving the baton to the other Chris for the anchor.

Here is where things got interesting. Holding tight to the lead, Aldrich tried to duplicate what Ferry had before him at states and get out hard to hold his lead. But he was up against an even better opponent than Crits: Axel Mostrag. The Fork Union Senior had put himself on the map that season with a 4:14 field house record at the Virginia State Championships, a 6 second victory. Later in the weekend, he would run 1:51.63 which was, at the time, the fastest indoor 800 for any Virginian (including Alan Webb).

Aldrich fought as hard as he could and Mostrag was not able to catch him until the final lap. Then, he went by and drove into first place, just ahead of Chris. He hung on as best he could, rallying for one final attack and then, off the last turn, he sprinted wide and charged for home. Mostrag could not respond and Chris brought it home for Henderson and Pennsylvania, giving the state a National Championship with a 10:16.57. Aldrich’s final split was 4:16.5 and he needed every second. Mostrag had dropped a 4:11.

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[1] I think I’ve run the 1200m somewhere in the ball park of 5 times in my career with an unofficial PR of 3:18 on a relay split in college. Even though I think I had the right skill set for it, things never quite clicked the way I hoped they would and my races at the distance were fairly average. My only good run came as a Junior in high school at Great Valley the morning of my Junior Prom. I ran 3:24 despite the fact that I fell during the hand off exchange with our 400m man. It’s usually a good day when I run to the point where my legs give out and I fall over. And yes, there’s a large enough sample size to support this hypothesis

[2] To be fair, Upper Dublin had no individual state qualifiers on their relay, so it’s not like those guys were making huge sacrifices. Wissahickon was only pulling Crits from an individual event and, at the time, he was considered a longshot contender at best. Really only GFS was pulling the plug on what appeared to be a sure fire medalist in Max Kaulbach. And GFS still ended up with an individual medalist in the 3k, Isaac Ortiz, who didn’t have the raw speed to make the cut for the DMR. Ortiz finished 5^th in 8:53.

[3] For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, they have a team title in track, but unlike Cross Country, I could care less who wins the team title. I can name you the teams that have won cross state titles for the last decade plus, but there is no way I could do that for track. Altoona has won a bunch, I’m sure North Penn has won some, Simon Gratz is in there and that’s pretty much all I know. It’s just that there are plenty of years where a “team” title is really more of a “we have a really good runner on our team” title. Like Chanelle Price or Ryan Krais basically can win state titles by themselves by winning four events. I guess I’m also bitter because distance programs have a very hard time winning state titles over sprint programs because top sprinters can double and triple easier than a top distance runner can.

But ignoring my opinion, they score the meet based on the top 8 finishers in each event. The point assignments for each finisher in the top 8 is 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1. So in other words if my team has the 4^th and 6^th place finishers, we score 8 points in that event. The team with the most points wins.

[4] I have literally no statistics or anything to base this off of, but I’m pretty sure CB South is the best team at coaching 1200 meter runners I’ve ever seen. Most notably, Joey Waddington (class of ‘11) who was one of the best pure 1200 guys I can remember.