During a ceremony before B-CC's home track meet Tuesday, the team and dozens of fans cheered the squad’s 16 seniors. In interviews afterward, Coaches Chad Young and Nathan Herchenroeder gave more personal assessments of the seniors, talking about not just their performance on the track, but their role off it as well.
This is the first of two parts, highlighting the boys team. The post on the girls team will go up on Sunday.
Boys team:
Chuck Banks
Nathan Herchenroeder: ``He has been on team past couple of years, started out as a sprinter, and then we felt like we could have used him as a shot putter or discus thrower. It’s something he took on himself. We have no shot put or discus coach. He’s been very successful in picking up tips at meets. He made it to states in indoor track, and done a really good job this season, taking a lot of the girls and guys who want to throw and teaching them what he has learned. He’s definitely a lively one on a workout, an outspoken person as well.’’
Alex Barrett
Chad Young: He’s our high jumper and also he’s a 400 meter runner. His highlight was qualifying for the states in high jump in the indoor season last year. He is a good leader as well; a lot of kids look up to him. He bridges that gap between sprinters and distance runners. When I started coaching there was a divide -- we had some groups on our team, and Alex has done a good job in bringing the groups together.
NH: ``He has made major strides last four years. In ninth grade, he wasn’t too serious, he probably didn’t attend practice much, and maybe ran one meet his freshman year. Sophomore year, he was a little more serious; he probably ran in two meets. Junior year he realized he did have some talent and he could help the team and he got really successful as a runner. It’s been great watching him develop into one of the leaders of the team now as a senior.’’
Andrew Crouch, captain
CY: ``He’s a very good student, extremely hard working. He hasn’t been happy with what he has done so far, but he wants to continue to improve. He’s making his way to the group of the faster guys. He’s so determined. He does a great job with the boys team in bringing them together for runs on the weekend. Distance guys are a rare bunch, and are more to themselves a bit, and need encouragement to run together on the weekends. If they are going to improve they need to run together, and Andrew does a good job in bringing them together.’’
Eric Damtoft
CY: ``He had that long, long streak of never missing a day running, but he has missed days now. He took time off after the indoor season because he was feeling extremely run down and needed a rest. He loves running, and fully committed to running and help his team and try to improve, but I think it’s smart he took that time off and regrouped and prepared for his senior year. One of top four guys in the 4 x 8, I think he’s going to have a good strong finish to the season. He does a good job keeping things interesting for the guys. He’s very outdoorsy. I was on a run the other day and I saw him climbing a building. Another day at practice they were repelling from the baseball field down to the track. He provides a little bit of excitement.’’
Ben Dixon
CY: ``It’s his first year running track, running shorter distances, 100 and 200 meters, extremely quiet. He was on the football team, and in the past it’s been difficult with the changing of football coaches to get players to come out for track team. He’s part of that group who decided to come out for track and work on their speed. ‘’
NH: ``He’s a hard worker and when we’ve needed him for races, he’s more than willing to step in. That’s a great personality trait – that he is willing to help.’’
Max Dudek
NH: He’s been on the team for three years or so, and I think Max was kind of stuck in between that spot not knowing if he was distance or sprinter. In track, he always liked sprinting events, and he has stuck to running the 200. He has made a lot of personal progress in his 200 time-- probably taken over the past two seasons about five seconds off his 200 time, which is huge. I know he is very vocal about those improvements, he gets excited.
Chris Henderson
NH: ``He had been playing soccer, but he made switch to run cross county in the fall the last two years, and that has helped his track performances. He’s now the top 800 on team, a big improvement from the past few years. He was over 2:20; he has worked his time down to 2:06. You could see something click with him the last year, being a lot more committed to running. He’s developed a passion for running and that has rubbed off on his teammates.’’
Brendan McClafferty
NH: ``He was a soccer player that joined the team last year for indoor track, and this year decided to do indoor and outdoor. He has stepped up to as a leader on the team, and has been leading workouts for the younger kids at practice. He’s had to really switch roles as far as races he is running. He had been running 400, now he is running 200 and 100, and think he has found his niche on the team.’’
Nick Richter
CY: ``Funny story about him -- and he shakes his head every time we tell it: He was a very small freshman. He was with three other guys, also small freshmen, at one big invitational meet, and we had a 4 x 400 team that was really great but at the last minute, somebody couldn’t run and we were going to scratch the relay. So there’s these freshmen out here, and not thinking much of it, and they wound up being in the fast heat in 4 x 4. They looked like little boys running against grown men; they were barely over 5 feet tall. We gave them an award, the Fearsome Foursome. That race they got lapped, and I had never seen that before in a 4 x 4 relay. He still continues to enjoy being on the team – he runs the mile, two mile and 800. Everyone on team calls him `Bonecrusher,’ for whatever reason. Maybe when he was a little freshman, everyone used to call him that because
he was a smaller guy, and so they gave him a name that made him feel bigger than he was.‘’
NH: ``He’s always been quiet on the team, and it’s interesting to see Nick Richter in his senior year really come out of his shell. He’s really outgoing, lively, social. It’s interesting to see, a great thing.’’
David Segun, captain
NH: ``He has run all four years, and I don’t think there’s anyone on the sprinting side these four years who has been a harder worker than David Segun. I think this season, he was finally put in this leadership role as captain and he has naturally fit that role. He is coming out of his shell as a good captain. I can see him pushing himself and leading by example and a lot of freshmen and sophomores are receptive to it. He is encouraging others constantly. Like Alex, he’s kind of a bridge between distance and sprinting. Also get along with anyone on the team. He’s going to be friendly to anyone on team no matter who you are.’’
Casey Shamma, captain
NH: ``He started off as a sophomore with a lot of talent as a sprinter. He really saw when he was a sophomore from the older guys what it is to be successful as a high school runner and has carried that on the last few years. He has fallen in love with running. He was a football player until this year, when he switched to cross country. Now he’s using it in his senior seasion to teach others, whether it is starting off on blocks, or handoffs, trying to demonstrate to others we can be successful but it takes a lot of hard work – all comes from that love of running from his sophomore year.’’
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