Running with the Buffaloes
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The underclassmen stretch before heading home to get ready for tomorrow morning’s departure for fall camp. Chris Valenti, a sophomore who ran on Goucher’s heels during the run, will be staying home, as will Jason Robbie. Wetmore says, “Valenti always looks heroic in practice,”
and he has looked great thus far. He is running with the top guys, and his long lean torso appears fit. For a walk-on like Valenti, judgment day is seventeen days away when he will try to earn his spot on the roster in the Varsity time trial. Valenti was on the squad a year ago, but each year all walk-ons must earn their spot on the roster. If they do not run competitively in the time trial—and this is a subjective decision on Wetmore’s part—they are done. Wetmore will be looking for Valenti to shine as he does in practice, and if he runs the way he has the past two days, he will be difficult to beat.
Jason Robbie faces a greater challenge. He is injured and demoral-ized. Despite making the squad a year ago, he too is guaranteed nothing.
He must also regain his spot on the roster in the time trial. He is quite upset about having to make the squad again, but Wetmore does not budge. Like Valenti, he will have to perform on September 5th. Otherwise, his journey will reach an all too premature conclusion.
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After the rest of their teammates have left Balch for home, seniors Goucher, Reese, and Batliner join women’s team members Heather Burroughs, Carrie Messner, and Jen Gruia to set an agenda for a team-only closed-door meeting at camp. The team-only powwow is a yearly tradition that they have all participated in in the past. Nevertheless, they have been unable to come to a consensus on the meeting’s agenda, so this is their third discussion on the task. Coaches Wetmore and Drake relax in Wetmore’s office, marveling at the seniors’ indecision. “So much for democracy,” says Wetmore, and they both break up laughing.
Camp this year will be held in Buena Vista, Colorado. Those hoping for a little alcohol-induced mayhem will be in for a surprise. There will be no booze, no panty raids, and no respite from the training. It will be especially difficult for Slattery and Elmuccio, who are just becoming acquainted with Boulder’s 5500-foot elevation, for the town of Buena Vista is situated at an unforgiving elevation of over 7000 feet.
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Thursday, August 20, 1998
Training Camp, Buena Vista, Colorado
3:30 p.m.
The Unspoken Agreement
Most of the men’s and women’s teams arrive in Buena Vista, Colorado, for their annual preseason training camp. Slattery, Tessman, and O’Mara are making their first trip to camp. Among those missing are the walk-ons who have yet to make the squad, including junior Jason Robbie. A Boulder native and University of Vermont transfer, Wetmore debated bringing Robbie with the squad. As Wetmore explains, he is “an inner circle guy,” well-liked by all of the team’s members. He was the most impressive man at the time trial last fall, yet he spent most of the year unable to compete because of injury, and now, still battling a sore IT
band, he is not assured of a spot on the squad. Also missing is senior Matt Napier, a likely redshirt senior who is the only married member of the team. He is staying in Boulder with his wife and two children.
According to Wetmore, the weekend “provides an opportunity for interpersonal intimacy few and far between once we’re in our normal routine.” The training camp presents him with the opportunity to better understand his charges, to “sit with Bat and talk about books, or to sit with Jay Johnson and talk of hiking in the Northern Cascades.”
Wetmore views camp as his opportunity to create a rapport be-
tween the staff and the athletes that will make work and trust easier down the road. More important, Wetmore sees the trip as the opportunity to start creating a synergy among the members. If successful, at season’s end, the sum of the parts will be greater than the whole.
O’Mara, Johnson, Schafer, Severy, Batliner, and Tessman chat and finish stretching.
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Wetmore also looks to camp to set the tone for the season. “This is when everyone looks each other in the eye and realizes we’re all here to do one thing in common: to train and be righteous. This is where they’ll make this unspoken agreement.”
Having arrived and checked into their rooms at the Buena Vista Inn, the runners load up the team vans and head four miles out of town for a relaxed run of 60 to 90 minutes. Coaches Wetmore and Drake found the trails the team will be running this weekend when they went to Buena Vista on two separate occasions last month to explore the area. As the runners stretch before heading out, Wetmore only half-jokingly exhorts them to pair up, because “we’re in serious mountain lion country.” He then reminds them to take it easy and run relaxed. “We’re running in two groups today, men and women. Take it easy, we’re running hard in fifteen hours.”
At 3:30 the runners head south on one of the loose dirt trails that roll gently in every direction. It is an overcast day, and the air is pleasant.
To the west are the “collegiate peaks.” Though overcast, the barren tops of Harvard, Princeton, and Yale are still visible. These are three of Colorado’s fifty-four 14,000 foot peaks, and their presence is majestic. There are miles and miles of trails, twisting between short juniper trees and rolling cactus. The runners chat amicably and run together at a leisurely pace. Goucher sets the pace up front. No one challenges his authority.
Despite the relaxed tempo, the run is still arduous. At an altitude of over 7000 feet, a molehill feels like a mountain.
One runner accustomed to the area’s endless dirt trails is sophomore Aaron Blondeau. Blondeau grew up and attended Salida High School in the neighboring town of Salida. He smiles easily, and shaggy blond hair frames his blue eyes and face. He is a man of few words, and he runs silently and contentedly in the back of the pack. A devout Chris -
tian, he sports a W.W.J.D. (What Would Jesus Do) bracelet on his wrist.
As a senior in high school he finished twelfth in the Foot Locker National High School Championships. He considered Princeton and Stanford before deciding on Colorado. Unlike most of his teammates, the intensely academic computer science major is living this year in a single room in the dorms. There are mandatory quiet hours every evening on his floor, a deciding factor in his decision to live there. Having excelled in the classroom last year with a 4.0 G.P.A., he stands poised to inherit Chris Severy’s mantle next year as the academic star of the squad.
As a freshman, he also excelled over hill and dale. He was the only freshman to make Colorado’s top seven and compete at the NCAA’s.
Blondeau finished 101st there, and followed that performance with a fine seventh-place finish at the US Junior championships. The latter performance earned him a spot on the US Junior National team competing at the RUNNING WITH THE BUFFALOES
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World Championships in March. After a successful indoor season in which he lowered his 5000-meter PR (personal record) to 14:42, he was poised to represent the U.S. before illness struck. A stress fracture in his shin stopped him cold the week before departing, and he was forced to miss the World Junior Championships in Morocco.
After recuperating and redshirting the spring track season, he returned to Salida this summer, working at a local Holiday Inn and running the nearby trails. A question mark heading into camp, he has shown Wetmore that he is ready to go. Blondeau has been running 65 miles a week, and he will be looked upon to make a big jump this year if Colorado is to contend for the national title.
The loose dirt turns to sand at points as the runners scramble on trails through the short pinion pines and scrubby little bushes that populate this arid climate. They finish with dirt in their te
eth, ready to work hard tomorrow at 7 a.m.
But first, there is other business to attend to. After showering, the men and women gather together for the team-only meeting in the hotel’s conference room. It is understood by the captains that they are to discuss and set the season’s objectives.
As everyone files in, seniors Reese, Goucher, and Batliner join women’s team seniors Burroughs, Gruia, and Messner in the front of the room. When everyone is settled in their seats, Reese begins the meeting by offering a quote: “If you’re not enjoying the journey, you probably won’t enjoy the destination.”
The mood is very understated and relaxed, and the seniors proceed to alternately take turns
adding their input about
the purpose of camp and
the goals for the season.
Reese adds, “We want to
make sure that we are all
on the same page, that we
are all fully invested.” More
to the point, Burroughs
says, “Mark wants to know
what our priorities are.”
What is interesting is
the element of choice. It is
Slattery, Reese, and
Roybal lead Blondeau,
Johnson, and Elmuccio.
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ingenious of Wetmore that he does not dictate what they will be shooting for, but that he lets them decide what they hope to achieve. It is their choice. Once they elect to aim high, they are effectively empowering Wetmore to train them as hard as he sees fit to take them to that level.
If they complain, he has but to remind them that they are the ones who decided they wanted to excel, he is merely following their prerogative.
Goucher understands this, and he will try to convey this to the underclassmen during the meeting. Later, after they have adjourned, he adds: Mark gives us the decision. Hey, if you want to go out on Saturday night and party and drink, fine, practice is at 8 a.m. Most people here want to be the best at what we do. We’ve chosen. We don’t want to live a lifestyle of partying. Maybe that’s why we fit so well with Mark. He doesn’t want to party either. He encourages us to make our own decisions in running and in life . . . That’s why this team is so righteous outside of running.
The decision to sacrifice for running is not Goucher’s alone. It is a collective decision. The road ahead will be tough, and they understand that they will need to lean on each other to get through the season. Creating and cementing the relationships that will enable them to survive is why they have camp. Batliner says, “We’re not here for training, we’re here to hang out and be friends, because friendship is the foundation of our team. When the foundation is friendship, it makes it a hell of a lot easier to get through the season.”
Taking this cue from Batliner, Roybal jokingly yells from the crowd,
“Heeyyyy! Let’s get some beer!” Everyone laughs, and Jay Johnson returns to the task at hand. “When we come together as a group,” he says, “we’ll be way stronger than as individuals. But get to know the personalities of the guys, because we’re individuals, we’re not carbon copies of each other; we’re neat.”
Inevitably there will be some personality conflicts during the season, but Johnson says, “Still, you don’t have to hang out, as long as you’re serious two hours a day.” The conversation continues in this vein before Goucher speaks for the first time:
We’re in a unique position. It’s my fifth year. Incoming freshmen, if you have any questions, come talk to us, we know what’s going on and we’re not above you or whatever . . . There’s such good talent in here, we’re there if we bring everyone together for that national number-one team, if that’s what you want to do. I think most people in here want that.
Batliner sarcastically responds, “Who doesn’t?” Already, the unspoken agreement is there; they are committed to doing what it takes to win the national title. Sensing this, Reese brings closure to the meeting after RUNNING WITH THE BUFFALOES
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only ten minutes. “This meeting is for the coaches,” he says. “It doesn’t show how dedicated we are.” Wetmore would be the first to concur with Reese. They will do their talking with their feet . . .
Later that evening, Tessman and O’Mara relax in their hotel room.
The succinct meeting is a welcome change for both. Burroughs says of the gathering, “We didn’t want to set a tone that was artificial or insincere.” The seniors achieved their objective. Says Tessman, “It didn’t feel like empty rhetoric. It’s cool to talk of winning NC’s matter-of-factly. It’s gonna happen.” O’Mara adds, “At Providence, Ray [Treacy, the Providence College coach] would say, ‘Don’t fuck it up!’ Not very inspirational. Here, we want to get over the hump of being top five. Until we win once, it’s kind of elusive . . . but you’re expected to do well at NCAA’s. It’s just a question of one, two, or three on the podium. Excellence is expected.”
Excellence indeed. Since Wetmore started coaching the Varsity men’s cross country team in 1993, Colorado has finished no worse than fifth at NCAA’s (fifth in 1996, fourth in 1993 and ’95, third in 1997, and second in 1994). Both transfers are thrilled to be a part of such a successful program, but Tessman has a greater sense of urgency than O’Mara. This is his last season, so he wants to win NOW! Wh ile never much of a cross country runner at Brown, Tessman is coming off of a breakthrough year after what he calls “three years of crap.” Last winter he made the transition from half-miler to miler with great success. He PR’ed in four consecutive races going from 4:15 to 4:11. But Tessman was just getting started. He continued his remarkable senior year outdoors with an opening 3:54 in the season’s first 1500-meter race. He quickly dropped his PR to 3:50, before having his breakthrough race at the Princeton Invitational. There, he surprised the field and finished a close second to Princeton alum and perennial national championship finalist Scott “Slicko”
Anderson in 3:44. Anderson recalls that, “I had no idea who he was. I knew [Brown miler] Neville Davey [also in the race] was legitimate, but I didn’t know who this other Brown character was. With 150 to go I was expecting them both to fade, especially this guy. But with 100 to go he made a move to grasp the lead, and I started to panic. I moved out to lane two and had to give it all I had to beat him down the stretch. This guy clearly had made a jump from being inconsequential to being a dominant force in the conference. He definitely has a chance to make a splash on the national scene.”
With this effort, Tessman provisionally qualified for NCAA’s. Knowing he was on the bubble, he skipped his graduation weekend to run a last-chance meet in Atlanta. Again, he ran 3:44. Heartbreakingly, he was the first non-qualifier for the NCAA’s. The last qualifying spot is burned into his memory: Chuck Sloan, Oklahoma State, 3:43.76. He is still salty 16
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about the experience, but he says, “It made me do what I’m doing this year.”
He chose Brown for its academics. He flatly admits he knew ab-
solutely nothing about the political science program in which he enrolled before matriculating to the University of Colorado. He is here because of Wetmore. He is here to “dedicate myself one hundred percent to running,” because he is convinced he is going to “do real well and have a great year if [he] trains with these guys.”
He knows only seven men will represent Colorado at the NCAA’s, and despite having finished a mere fourteenth last season at the Heptagonal (Ivy League and Navy) cross country championships, his spring track season has given him reason to believe he can take one of the spots. Although he has been in town training with the guys for but a few weeks, his new teammates have made him feel welcome. He says, “I’ve gotten a great reception from the guys on the team . . . I get the feeling they’re excited that I’m here, I’m appre
ciated. I feel no animosity towards me because I have a shot at one of the top seven spots. There’s respect there.”
After having been on a Brown team that never won a conference
title, let alone a national crown, Tessman is eager to do anything to taste victory. “My goal for the fall is to help these guys win a national championship any way I can. If I can score as the fifth guy, or be seventh and dis-place someone, I’ll be jacked. I feel I have one year to be as much a part of this team as I can.”
With his age and experience, he adds veteran leadership to an already senior-laden squad. And, he brings an outsider’s perspective—an appreciation of Wetmore and how excellent the program really is. “At Brown,” he says, “we never won Heps, so there was this undercurrent that we weren’t winners.” Colorado won the inaugural Big 12 title in 1996 and defended that title last year. Tessman knows that another Big 12 title is likely this year. Moreover, he knows what the track community thinks of CU’s chances of winning Nationals. “I hope everyone here thinks we can win it, because on the outside everyone thinks we can.”
And according to Tessman, there is one leader steering the ship. “Here,”
he says, “there is no negativity about Wetmore. Everyone takes Wetmore’s word as law.”
If there is one runner who takes Wetmore’s word as law more than any other, it is Goucher. Wetmore says of his star, “This guy is absolutely the most loyal team-oriented guy I’ve ever had.” Goucher explains: He has molded me and helped me become the person I am from day one.
This guy has been everything from my coach to a father figure to my best friend. He’s done it not by imposing his ideas on me, which he does, but he RUNNING WITH THE BUFFALOES
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