Saugatuck Wins Despite Concord Repeat
November 2, 2013
By Bill Khan
Special to Second Half
BROOKLYN — Jesse Hersha had just crossed the finish line with his second MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 4 cross country championship, but he wasn't thinking about himself.
As soon as the Concord junior finished the 3.1-mile course Saturday at Michigan International Speedway, he turned around and watched the race unfold behind him.
Of particular interest were the purple and gold jerseys of his Concord teammates, who were engaged in personal battles that would determine whether or not the Yellowjackets would win a third straight team championship.
Trying to do the math with so many bodies sprinting to the line proved to be too difficult, as did the challenge of securing a three-peat. Concord had to settle for a third-place finish with 134 points, marking the sixth straight year it finished in the top six.
"I wasn't focused on my race so much as I was focused on my team's race," Hersha said. "We didn't do as well as we would've hoped, but it happens."
It was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Hersha would win a second straight championship, but stranger things have happened at MIS. He dominated the field as expected, posting a time of 15:49.2 on a muddy course to win by a whopping 44.8 seconds over East Jordan senior Josh Wojan.
"It felt a lot different, because this year you knew as well as I did that I had a really good chance of winning it," Hersha said. "I'd beaten almost everyone there except (Evart's David) Zinger last year, but I still had that doubt. This year, I didn't have that doubt at all."
Hersha took off hard and didn't give anyone a chance to get into the race. Pushing himself when nobody else was around to assist was the most difficult part for Hersha.
"It's tough, but you've got to think to yourself, 'I've got to get going,'" he said. "I could jog the last 100 meters and maybe still win, but you've got to keep pushing yourself, even if no one else is pushing you."
For someone accustomed to winning easily, Hersha said his most memorable race this season was the only one he didn't win. He ran with the larger schools at the Spartan Invitational (at Michigan State University) on Sept. 13, taking third in a personal-best 15:31. He won his other 13 races this year.
"That was fun," he said. "By the time I got to the second mile, guys were catching up with me and passing me. It was a lot different."
Dethroning Concord as Division 4 champion was Saugatuck, which scored 113 points to edge Mount Pleasant Sacred Heart by eight.
The difference, as it often does, came down to the fifth and final scoring runner. Saugatuck junior Joe Brown was 40th among team runners in 17:52.2, 17 places ahead of Sacred Heart sophomore Sam Neyer (18:07.4).
Junior Jacob Pettinga led Saugatuck, placing third overall in 16:36.9. Senior Clayton Springer was seventh among team runners (16:53.7), freshman Nick Butch was third (17:27.0) and freshman Zachary Pettinga was 38th (17:48.1).
Only three Saugatuck runners had ever competed in the MHSAA meet, with three freshmen in the varsity seven. The team's best finishes ever were fourth-place showings in 2006, 2007 and 2012. Saugatuck had never qualified for the MHSAA Finals until 2001, but has now made it eight of the last 13 years.
PHOTO: Concord's Jesse Hersha extends his lead on the way to his second straight MHSAA championship. (Click to see more from RunMichigan.com.)
Ovid-Elsie Running Legend Darling Seeking to 'Win the Day' on Trading Floor
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
August 13, 2024
Maverick Darling’s competitive running days have been behind him for nearly a decade, but the eight-time MHSAA Finals champion from Ovid-Elsie isn’t done competing.
Darling, who was also a five-time All-American at Wisconsin, is now fighting for wins on the Viking Forest Products lumber trading floor in Minnesota.
“Our trading floor is very unique,” Darling said. “We have 60 traders, and probably 30-35 of them are former student-athletes in college. It’s very competitive, but kind of like a locker room. It’s kind of a unique way for me to still be competitive even though I’m not in athletics. I really love it.”
Darling is a commodity trader at Viking Forest, trading mostly OSB, plywood and dimensional lumber to buyers throughout the United States. He lives with his fiancé Danielle and their two dogs in Plymouth, Minn., a suburb of Minneapolis.
Lessons learned while working toward Finals titles on the dirt roads of Ovid and national goals on the trails of Madison, Wis., are helping him find success again.
“My lessons I learned from running and the reward, whether good, great or OK, is that no matter the day, you have to go put in the effort and work, and it carries over to my work,” he said. “I now literally start over every day. We had a saying: ‘Win the day.’ And ‘Win the day’ kind of means something different for every day. I try to apply that to my life. It’s motivating to be successful every day.”
Friendly competition between teammates leading to greater success also carried over from cross country and track to the trading floor.
“We have a department where it feels almost like my cross country team in college,” he said. “One guy will put up 30 orders that day, and we’re all happy for that person. The synergy between the group is awesome. But it motivates me to be like, tomorrow that’s going to be me.”
Darling had spent his first three years out of Wisconsin running professionally and had coaching stops at Iona and Cal-Berkeley after that. But when the pandemic hit, he stepped away from coaching and made the move to trading.
That ended a spectacular career in the sport, which was actually second choice for most of Darling’s childhood.
Growing up, he was a top snowmobile racer, along with his brother.
“My first (high school) cross country race, I took seventh,” Darling said. “I didn’t know better, but that’s pretty good. My mom was like, ‘Seventh? You know, we’re used to first or second (in snowcross).’ We’re not a running family. I started at about 18 minutes in the 5K, and at the state meet I finished eighth and ran 16:13. I was like, ‘OK, maybe this is something I can really be good at.’”
It was at the end of his junior year, after winning his heat at the Nike Outdoor Nationals, that Darling turned his entire focus to running. By that time, he had already won two Division 3 cross country titles, two 3,200-meter titles and one 1,600 at MHSAA Finals.
He was training often, but knew he was undertrained because of the limitations on where and when he could run during mid-Michigan winters. Colleges knew it, too, and that led to a barrage of communication as soon as they were able to reach out.
“I probably had 150 of those (hand-written letters) sent to the house,” Darling said. “I would get two to three phone calls a night after July 1. It wasn’t like overwhelming, because I was pretty confident at that point where I wanted to go to school.”
Darling committed to Wisconsin on the day of the Lower Peninsula Cross Country Finals his senior year. He also won his third Finals title that day with a then-Division 3 record time of 14:52. At the time, it was the third fastest time ever run in Michigan.
He would later win his second straight 1,600/3,200 double at the Track & Field Finals, running 8:58 in the 3,200 during the season, which was the 12th-best high school time in the country that year.
The choice to go to Wisconsin was based on his drive to be challenged as much as possible.
“I thought, ‘If I come into this room, I’m probably the eighth or ninth best runner in this room – maybe,’” Darling said. “I had such a great recruiting trip. I grew up in Ovid, and everything I ran there was pretty much dirt roads. Wisconsin has a lot of dirt trails, and I kind of loved that. I could run from our locker room and be on a trail in a mile, mile and a half.”
Darling’s collegiate career proved he had made the right decision. He was the Big Ten Freshman of the Year for the 2009 cross country season, and an All-American in 2010 and 2012. He was a three-time All-American in track, as well.
The Badgers also had massive team success during Darling’s tenure, winning a cross country national title in 2011, four Big Ten cross country titles and two Big Ten track & field titles.
Darling was surrounded by great runners throughout his time in Madison, including close friend Mohammed Ahmed, who finished fourth in the 10,000 meters at this Olympics, one spot behind another Michigan distance star, Grand Blanc’s Grant Fisher.
Watching the results of a distance boom he was a big part of has been a joy for Darling this summer.
“I thought I was pretty good, then watching these guys – it’s jealousy,” he said with a laugh. “And also, it’s just cool to see. Michigan is one of the best distance states men’s and women’s-wise. It’s great to see them not only be on the international level, but to have that success.”
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PHOTOS (Top) At left, Maverick Darling crosses the finish line during a race as an Ovid-Elsie senior in 2007; at right Darling poses with fiancé Danielle. (Middle) Darling rounds a turn during a high school race. (Below) Darling and Danielle enjoy a sunset over the water with her parents. (Photos courtesy of Maverick Darling.)