Grant Invite 2023
WARRIORS WIN GRANT "JT" INVITE! FROSH/SOPH WIN TOO!
After illness limited Deerfield to two 16th place finishes at their last two major invites, a healthy squad lined up at the Grant “JT” Invite and won the whole thing.
Within the first minute of Grant’s course is a very steep hill and then the course narrows quickly. All seven Deerfield varsity runners did not get out hard enough and got trapped in the back half of the race. They had to weave around all the runners to get to up to the front, and Deerfield’s pack fell apart in the traffic. By the time they emerged from the wooded part of the course for the first time, Jamie Chandler, Dylan Cohen, and Jon Wool were in a good position at the front of the race. In the second mile, Cohen pulled ahead of Chandler and finished in sixth place. Chandler had a tough third mile but managed to hold on to ninth. Eric Hogenkamp got caught in traffic early but caught up to Wool in mile two, and the pair finished in 12th and 13th. Dane Brown and Scott Harvey worked together in the second half of the race with Ben Freedman not too far behind. They finished in 20th, 22nd, and 24th. With all five scorers in the top twenty, plus all seven runners in the top 24, the performance earned Deerfield the team title over Grant in second and Vernon Hills in third. The Warriors got a nice trophy for their efforts, and while its worth celebrating, most of the runners felt like they still have more in store for the future.
Deerfield had quite a day on the frosh/soph level too. Despite having their top two sophomores pulled up to varsity and another scorer out for injury precaution, the young Warriors scored just 29 points for a dominating victory. Sam Chaban sat on the back of the race leader for most of the race until he could not hold on to that pace any longer. He still held on for second place. Will Lambert finished in third. Andrew Calderon moved up from outside the top 20 to fifth in the final two miles. While times were not fast due to the challenging course and a fair bit of heat, Calderon still managed to break the 18-minute barrier for the first time. Charlie Marks finished in seventh, and Logan Luo rounded out the scoring for Deerfield in twelfth. While times were not fast at this meet, all the freshmen still set PRs having improved a ton since they last raced three miles over three weeks ago on this course. For Ethan Reich and Jasper Fine it was a bit of déjà vu as they finish one second apart, only this time it was in the mid 19s instead of the mid 21s. Eliot Naylor had the biggest PR of the day of 21:48, which was 2:15 faster than last time.
In the JV race, Deerfield was engaged in a battle with Vernon Hills for the team title. Deerfield had the fire-power up front with a 1-2 finish from Nick Dowell and Danny Kriegel, but Vernon Hills’ depth was too much as they won with 30 points over Deerfield in second with 39.
Winning the Grant “JT” Invite was a great confidence boost as Deerfield heads into the second half of the season with the most important meets only a few weeks away.
