Neshaminy track and field has been producing impressive sprinting results during the last decade, churning out a slew of sub 50 400m men and an excellent 100m runner in Kevin Steinberg. Last year Neshaminy produced a 53 second 400m hurdler in Dave Marrington, who also ran a blistering 38.0 in the 300 hurdles at states.
But Neshaminy has not established itself as a mid distance power the way Abington did in the 2008-2011 years. Nor has it produced many state qualifying runners in distance. They had one state medalist in the last 10 years (Ted MacDonald in 2007) and have yet to produce a 4x8 that qualified for outdoor states in recent memory (admittedly no easy task in the loaded district one).
This year things are (early on) heading in a different direction. Neshaminy has burst out the gates with an 8:22.0 and a huge win in early December over many other top preseason distance powers. And they did it without 4:40 miler Eric Chapman who was the teams only state qualifier this past year in cross country.
I'm not sure who was on the relay, but Neshaminy returns some solid, under the radar pieces from a year ago. The big early season change is coming from Dave Marrington, the top tier 300m hurdler who ran an open 2:03 and likely played a key role on Neshaminy's SQS last meet. His move to the 800m is huge for this team and he may be he next breakout star at that position. Another X factor could be Sean Conway, a sub 50 400m runner who may have the stuff to move up to the 8 (or at least be a top tier 4 leg on a competitive DMR).
Many top 800m runners got their start in the quarter. Jon Lewis, 1:50.01 last year, was state champ at 400m. Sam Ellison went from 48 400m man to 1:52 800m man in a years time. Hong Cho, Charles Ross, Will Taylor, Connor Manley and many more were 400 converts.
And 400m hurdlers are perfect for the switch. No long hurdles indoors makes the 800m ideal. One of the US's best 800m men, Brandon Johnson, was a 400m hurdler in college and now runs 1:43.
But it takes the right type of runner to make the move up into distance territory. Face it, many sprinters are talent driven rather than work ethic driven and even the most motivated of workers are scared off by the idea of long runs or tempos or 1k repeats.
Not saying it doesn't take hard work to be good at sprinting (it definitely does) it's just different work and just like many distance runners would shy away from a sprinters routine, many sprinters would do the same.
It takes a truly special athlete to transcend this barrier and that's what state champion caliber relays like Abington and Bensalem have been so good at doing.
Who knows where Neshaminy will go from here but on paper they have a top DMR and top 4x8 (and maybe a top 4x4) waiting in the wings. This could be a program changing year for this squad.
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