Riley Hough first, Pat Koon fifth in the boys' 5,000 at New Balance Nationals

Like most athletics tracks, the University of Pennsylvania oval at Franklin Field in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania is 400 meters long. Unlike most tracks, it's only 400 meters long in lane four. These odd dimensions haven't prevented Franklin Field from hosting the annual Penn Relays or, on 16-19 June 2022, the New Balance Nationals. Hartland High senior Riley Hough won the boys' 5,000 during the Thursday evening, 16 June 2022, session of the meet, throwing down a sub-60 last lap to outkick Hunter Jones, a Benzie Central junior, 14:21.81 to 14:22.57. Seniors dominated the field, Nine of the athletes in the field of eighteen were seniors, seven juniors. The remaining two were sophomores. The fastest of that pair was Pat Koon of Leon High, who took fifth in 14:40.21.


It was Patrick Koon's first time racing 5,000 meters on the track, and probably for most of the rest of the field as well. Although 5,000 is a typical distance for high school cross-country races in the United States, high school events longer than 3200 meters are unusual. In the New Balance Nationals race, Koon was tucked into the lead group for 3,400 meters. Then, with four laps to go, Riley Hough picked up the pace. Koon slowed. The sophomore was out of contact by the time Hough and Jones had begun their bell-lap duel.


Koon wasn't the only Tallahassee distance runner to appear in the NBN boys' 5000. As a Leon senior, Matt Mizereck won the race in 20210, running 14:37.19. Another Leon senior, Ben McMahon ran 15:40.75 at NBN in 2012, placing 30th. Chiles senior Carly Thomas raced the girls' 5000 at NBN in 2012, placing 22nd in 18:20.96.


The seniors in the field won't be back for the 2023 high school track and field season; in fact, they've already graduated. Only the two sophomores, including Koon, could still be doing high school races in 2024. Nothing is given, but the Leon sophomore could have a bright future ahead.


High School Boys' 5000 Results, 2022 New Balance Nationals

1. 14:21.81, Riley Hough (Hartland) 12
2. 14:22.57, Hunter Jones (Benzie Central) 11
3. 14:34.78, Jack Gregorski (Corning-Painted Post) 12
4. 14:38.15, Micah Wilson (St Charles East) 12
5. 14:40.21, Patrick Koon (Leon) 10
6. 14:44.35, Brian DiCola (Hatboro Horsham) 11
7. 14:53.74, Brayden Seymour (Hagerty) 11
8. 15:00.39, Christopher Sullivan (Catholic Memorial) 11
9. 15:00.53, Keegan Souhan (Beavercreek) 12
10. 15:00.53, Evan Thornton-Sherman (St Johnsbury) 12
11. 15:02.97, Eamon Burke (Xavier) 12
12. 15:04.81, Andrew Littlehales (Delsea Regional) 12
13. 15:08.99, Michael Bohlke (Newington) 12
14. 15:19.16, Rithikh Prakash (Burlington) 11
15. 15:31.44, Evan Jarold (Brunswick) 12
16. 15:40.98, Jake Borgesi (South Fayette) 11
17. 15:56.77, Paul Maguire (Don Bosco) 11
18. 16:25.50, Connor Domoy (Oakfield-Alabama) 10

New Balance Nationals Boys' 5000m Champions, 1994 - 2022
Date	Time	Athlete	School	Year
20 June 1994	15:37.66	Jordan Wolf	Hastings (NY)
15 June 2006	14:48.73	Ben Massam	Chatham (NJ)	12
14 June 2007	14:38.23	Adam Vess	Xavier (CT)	12
19 June 2008	14:38.23	Solomon Haile	Sherwood (MD)	11
18 June 2009	14:32.36	Solomon Haile	Sherwood (MD)	12
17 June 2010	14:37.19	Matt Mizereck	Leon (FL)	12
16 June 2011	14:25.74	Edward Cheserek	Saint Benedict's (NJ)	12
14 June 2012	14:27.16	Jake Leingang	Bismarck (ND)	11
14 June 2013	14:11.61	Jake Leingang	Bismarck (ND)	12
13 June 2014	14:16.61	Alex Ostberg	Darien (ME)	11
19 June 2015	14:35.71	Will Lauer	Lincoln (SD)	12
17 June 2016	14:37.09	David Principe, Jr	La Salle (RI)	11
16 June 2017	14:36.13	Ryan Oosting	Arlington (MA)	10
15 June 2018	14:32.96	Andrew Mah	Newton North (MA)	12
13 June 2019	14:26.18	Robbie Cozean	Xavier (CT)	11
16 June 2022	14:21.81	Riley Hough	Hartland (MI)	12
After the 5,000 was introduced at the NSAF meet in 1994, it wasn't run again till 2006. The meet was canceled in 2020 and 2021 due to COVID-19.

Links

• New Balance Nationals
  https://www.nbnationalsout.com/
  
  
• Run in the Tallahassee region in a race on the Trouble Afoot! calendar
  https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/search/label/calendar?max-results=1
  
  

#2838

Kent Mills was Florida State's Marathon Man at Boston in 1960

Monday, 20 April 2020, won’t be a typical Patriots’ Day in Boston, Massachusetts. Because of CoViD-19, the bars won’t be open. The Red Sox won’t be playing in Fenway Park. The Boston Marathon won’t be run, rescheduled for 14 September 2020. And with no Marathon, there will be no one at the starting line in Hopkinton from Tallahassee, Florida.


Tallahassee athletes have been racing the Boston Marathon for quite some time. In fact, back on Patriots’ Day 19 April 1960, Florida State University junior Kent Mills made the trip from Tallahassee to Hopkinton for the 64th annual Boston. It was what Tom Derderian, a historian of the event, described as “A perfect day for running. A 15-mile-an-hour tailwind on a clear, brisk 50 °F day.” Taking advantage of the conditions, Mills ran 2:48:59, placing 26th overall.


It was a smaller race then, with only 156 starters. Of those, 83 finished. Among those who dropped out along the way was John J. Kelley, the 1957 Boston champion. The 1960 race was also one of three Olympic Trial Marathons for the United States team. In spite of not finishing, Kelley was placed on the U.S. squad. It was a different time.


For Mills, Boston wasn’t his first marathon, nor his fastest. In fact, Mills was already a national marathon champion, in spite of having only been a runner for less than three years.


Growing up in Pontiac, Michigan, Mills hadn’t run in high school. He took up the sport as a freshman at Florida State University during the 1957-1958 academic year, coached by Mike Long. Mills raced the half-mile that year, running 2:01. Even in the 1950s, that performance wasn’t NCAA All-American material. But Mills’ future was in the longer distances. As a sophomore he set the Florida State school record in the two-mile run, going 9:31.4 during the 1959 track season.


Florida State didn’t have a cross-country team in 1959, so late that fall Mills made his own way into Alabama for the third annual Troy Chamber of Commerce Cross-Country Meet. The meet was hosted by Troy State coach Nick Costes, the 1955 US national champion in the marathon and a member of the 1956 US Olympic Marathon team. If Mills hadn’t been thinking about the marathon already, he was now. And the AAU was hosting the National Junior Marathon Championship in Atlantic City, New Jersey on 2 January 1960.


“The team couldn’t afford to send me,” Mills told the school newspaper, the Flambeau. “The University doesn’t sponsor a cross-country team, and the track team was in no position to pay my way up. I wanted to run so bad I could taste it...I had never run the distance before, but I wanted to try.”


So Mills spent nine days of the winter break hitchhiking north, spending seventeen hours on the road. He made it to Philadelphia at 2:00 AM on 27 December 2020, just eleven hours before the start of the Middle Atlantic Road Runners’ Club Cross-Country Championship. Mills won that 10,000-meter race in 33:51.


After spending nearly a week in Philadelphia, Mills found a ride with another athlete heading to Atlantic City for the Marathon. He trailed during the first half of the out-and-back route. With ten miles to go in the 26.2-mile race, Mills moved up into the lead group. He began to push the pace after that, dropping the rest of the leaders.


“I thought, ‘This can’t be right, I can’t be winning this race,’” Mills told the Flambeau.


Nevertheless, Mills won the race by over half a mile, taking the national title with a 2:30:35. At the end of the year, it would stand as the eighth-fastest marathon by an American during 1960, an Olympic year.


The day after the race, Mills started hitchhiking back to Tallahassee.


Unlike the Junior National Marathon, Boston was in the middle of track season and in the middle of Florida State’s spring session. Mills still made it to Massachusetts for the race, but his 2:48:59 was well off what he had run in his first marathon. Several of the athletes he had beaten in Atlantic City were among the 25 runners ahead of him at Boston. Six days later, Mills was back in Florida, racing at Gainesville in the FSU-UF dual meet. He took third in the mile and second in the two-mile for the Seminoles. Florida State won that day, and the team went undefeated during the 1960 season.


Mills spent another year competing for Florida State before graduating in 1961. He did not log any more marathon victories as a Seminole. But if you’re ever in Hopkinton on the starting line of the Boston Marathon, remember that Kent Mills was there before you.


Links

• "Tallahassee's top finishers at the Boston Marathon during the 21st century"
  https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2018/04/baa-marathon-2018.html
  
  
• "Tallahassee's turn-of-the-century track team"
  https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2009/06/tallahassees-turn-of-century-track-team.html
  
  
• Tom Derderian, Boston Marathon: The First Century of the World's Premier Running Event
  https://amzn.to/3cqsb4W
  
  
• Find upcoming marathons and other races in the Tallahassee region on the Trouble Afoot! calendar
  https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/search/label/calendar?max-results=1
  
  

#2697