MONDAY MORNING FINISH LINE

August 22, 2022

By Michael Newman [email protected]

It is the first day where high schools can compete in Cross Country Meets in the state of Illinois. Some teams that will start their season on August 27. Some the following week. Some the week after that. It does not matter to me. It just means that I will have more results to post and talk about. That is a good thing.

I am beginning my 47th year of being involved in someway with cross country in this state and now beyond. It is truly hard to believe. I had to have a teammate talk me into joining York’s Cross Country team. I was scared in starting something new. I was starting high school and that was scary enough. There was this one guy leading the team that scared the hell out of me. In time, I grew to like him as a teacher, coach, mentor, and then friend. I think all of you know how much Mr. Newton meant to me. There have been times when I have been asked “You still call him Mr. Newton?”

I never called him Joe, or even Coach Newton. He would correct people that were on his team. “Do I call you student Smith?” I always got a laugh from that. I could understand. I had been through all of that for four years. Some of you will understand this years after you graduate. You wish you could put on that high school singlet and experience those highs and lows. I miss talking to him. I would get phone calls on Saturday night. “Are you busy #1?” I was never too busy to talk to him. Even on a Saturday night, I planned out what I would do that night anticipating that phone call.

I received advice from him even when I was an adult. When I moved back from Chicago, I showed up at a practice and he was shocked to see me. But then, Mr. Newton started asking me questions just about my life. He supported me in what I do now. He was one of my biggest fans even though he did not have the internet. Coaches, friends would print off things that I had created. I would be at practice every Monday then, now, But when I got to the track, he was always there and after he talked to the team, he told me what he thought. I appreciated his sometime brutal honesty.

I appreciated people that I met because of Newton. He was the meet director for the Foot Locker Midwest Regionals held at Katherine Legge Memorial in Hinsdale. I had a bad end to my season at North Central College and I just wanted to go watch a meet. Mr. Newton caught me as I entered the park and put me to work right away. He had a talent to get you to do something that you did not want to do. Please refer the times that I ran 25x440, 5 x 1mile, 8 x3/4 etc, etc. He knew I was hurting inside. He asked me to go into the red cabin to get him a clipboard.

There were no clipboards there. There was Sebastian Coe sitting in that cabin. He was scouting the area for when he came to Chicago to train before the Olympics. I was shocked. He introduced himself and then told me Mr. Newton had told him what I was going through. I was just a couple of minutes, but I remember that conversation. No pictures with him. We were not in the selfie age back then; My mom went back to get his autograph for me because I was too awe struck.

I have been involved 47 years as runner, as a coach, as a meet director, as a Dad watching his daughter run, to what I do now. I really can’t describe what I do now. It would take so much time to explain. It is a dream to be able to do something that you have such a passion for. I have been blessed.

The involvement I have with this sport has helped me write stories like this. I have the experience from being on a state championship team in high school to finishing second a year later. I was a part of two national championship teams at North Central College, then second-place in nationals. I learned so much in all of the races I was involved in. It has helped me so much what is understanding with a team in a race, or a runner’s strategy that I have experienced. So, some of you may doubt some of the things that I have done. I have a whole treasure chest of experiences, memories that I can relate through. Those of you who doubt that, maybe you should check to make sure that all your tools are in your toolbox.

I love writing the previews for the upcoming cross-country season. It is a grind. I am so proud of what I put out this year. I thought the same thing last year, but I look at ways to do it a little better. Vague is not something I can accept when writing it. I want you to enjoy it like eating a nice piece of Filet Mignon. I did not write six previews. It was set up that way. It was more so writing close to 300 short stories about those teams. Sorry I could not write about every school in the IHSA.

The experiences that I have gone through take full effect when I put out the previews of some coaches doubting rankings. I like to say those emails or twitter posts. I never post I told you so at the end of the year. I never post anything. I just keep a smirk smile on my face. It is not where you start but you have a fun journey getting to the finish line to realize your dream.

A sore subject came up on Twitter on Sunday after I released all the previews. A conversation began that all the teams that are in the 2A Girls Sectional that will take place in Kaneland. It is so loaded there will be some great teams that will not make it to the state meet. We saw that last year at the 3A Hinsdale Central last year where some great teams in regionals and then that sectional race that did not advance.

There were some outlandish proposals that were going on Twitter. I kept thinking that you guys just don’t get it. You don’t have all the cards in a 52 card deck. All of your tools are not in the toolbox. You just can’t move regionals around from sectional to sectional after a regional has been assigned to said sectional. The IHSA has standards for all of this from choosing sites and along, more importantly, on how teams are assigned to sectionals. It is not what you think.

There are two factors to understand. The first is the IHSA cares about schools stepping up to host state series competitions. Let’s just stop talking about the costs of hosting a state series meet. There are some sites that were designed to host a state series meet. They know how to run a meet. Lake Park is an example that knows how to host that sectional meet. The quicker we get the assignments filled, the easier it is for the IHSA to set up the assignments. They have to wait until the state series entry deadline. Ohio has set regional sites that schools compete at to advance to their state meet. Why can’t happen in this state? There are still two TBA sectional sites as I write this. Why? Don’t start the BS argument of costs.

The second thing is that we don’t have the sectional assignment argument because of what the advisory committee did to this sport three years ago. I still try to figure out how some of those people that were on that committee are involved or even coaching cross-country.

Let’s cut 2A & 3A sectionals to four sectionals from five. The main argument we heard was wow, there will be more kids running in the state meet. What was never considered in how this effects schools that normally made it to the sectional. Less runners now advance from regionals to sectionals. We have still not seem decrease of teams participating in the sport because of this. I can tell you that it is coming. It is that gut instinct from the experiences that I have had.

The mess that we were in was never discussed before the advisory committee met. The main proposal was to cut the regionals from three to two in each of the five sectionals in Class 2A & 3A qualifying 9 teams from each regional. 18 teams would still be in sectionals like the old set up is. From there, advance six teams out of the sectional to state. 30 teams run then at state. That is the same team number that we see in Class 1A now.

Instead, we have one member that spewed their agenda. They did have an agenda selfish as it may be. They proposed something that did not make sense and convinced the other members and then the IHSA. It is just something that has now made this sport a mess when we talk about sectional assignments.

There were Class 2A coaches at that time that thought this new set up was great. Now we get these arguments and proposals that do not make sense. 5 sectionals over 4 sectionals we do not have this happening. You approved the idea that the advisory committee set forth. You made your bed. Now, sleep in it.

There are so many stories that I can relate to this from all my time that I have experienced. Things like this have happened before, just not this much of a mess.

So, let’s celebrate this season. Enjoy the sounds of a gun going off to start a race, the sounds of feet hitting the ground, and the sounds of water splashing up on a soggy course.

I’ll appreciate those things again this year like I have in years before that. When you get older and wiser you appreciate those things a little more.