"I love the heat!" exclaimed Juliet Bottorff after winning the women's 10k at the first day of the NCAA Championships at Drake University in Des Moines, IA this evening. " I'm from Delaware, so it doesn't really match up, but I really like the heat!" Bottorff has good reason to forever love the heat as in hot and humid conditions (race time temperature: 85 degrees, 39% humidity), Bottorff bided her time and ran in the pack and saved energy for the whole race before grabbing glory with a last lap that truly was a thing of beauty.
The pace really dawdled in the opening miles as the Wichita State Shocker duo of Aliphine Tuliamuk and Tonya Nero led the field through the 1600 in 5:46 and 3200 in 11:43 (5:56 2nd 1600). The third 1600 split of 5:18 pared the lead pack to 15.
In terms of kilometers, the pace was very slow for 3km before getting a little bit more honest on the 4th kilometer and the pace would stay modest but consistent until the very end. From 3k on, the lead pack got in the groove with steady kilometer splits between 3:21-3:25 for kilometers 4 through 9. After 6k, slowly the death march in the heat was taking its toll as a few runners would fall off the lad pack each kilometer. At 7k, the race was all about Cyclones and Shockers as the Iowa State duo of Betsy Saina and Dani Stack joined the two from Wichita State up front for much of the time. No one was really making a move. At 7,600 meters, U. of New Mexico's Ruth Senior tried to mix it up but would fade to 9th place overall. With 4 laps remaining, there were still 10 or 11 women still in the lead pack. The pace would get faster each lap to the finish but not by much until the final lap. At 8,700 meters, disaster struck as Betsy Saina, who had done much ot the leading, suddenly collapsed to the infield and became an unexpected DNF.
At 9,000, there were still 8 in the lead pack and women's running was going to have a rarity - a ton of girls battling it out for an NCAA title over the last 1k. So many women were still in contention as no one was making moves and the pace wasn't increasing that much. Over the last four laps, the steady stream of 81 and 82 second laps got faster but only to 80, 79, 77 before there was one lap to glory.
And in an instant, the race was over. As the runner's approached the bell, Duke's Juliet Bottorff hammered to the front and within the span of maybe 20 meters it was clearly over. In May, we had watch Bottorff sit patiently in a large pack and then destory the ECAC field over the last lap and had been so impressed we called her our upset pick to win in the LetsRun.com preview. Now Botorff, who came in seeded 5th (but only 8 seconds behind #1), was destroying the NCAA 10,000 meter field just as we had thought might be possible. If you have the best kick, a wise energy is to do zero work, save energy and then unleash it at the very end and Bottorff did this perfectly.
Bottorff's 67.4 last lap was a thing of beauty. It was 3.44-seconds better than what anyone else in the field had in the tank and it gave her a huge 4.49-second margin of victory as West Virginia's Kate Harrison finished 2nd. Arizona sophomore Jennifer Bergman had a great run to finish 3rd as gradually moved up and equalled her Pac 10 placing. After the race, Bergman remarked how her coach Erin Dawson is always encouraging her that she is capable of great things. Looking outside the interview area, she laughed as she saw her coach jumping up and down and going nuts. Iowa State's Dana Slack finished fourth while the Witchita State duo of Tuliamuk and Nero finished 5th and 7th, respectively.
Tara Erdmann of Loyola Marymount had the fastest time going in (33:10) was never a factor and finished in 21st place. After nearly tripping twice in earlier laps, BYU's Morgan Haws hit the wall in the last lap and crawled over the line on all fours in 12th place, a testament to the very tough conditions in tonight's 10k.
1 comment:
is she single?
Post a Comment