Fastest high school kids who never ran a step again after finishing high school?

There is this guy who is insanely talented who resurfaces every couple of years in my area to stomp everyone in local 5K's. This one year he was at every local small 5K race, and won all of them. Like a string of 15 consecutive wins. It was nuts.

He ran a 1:55 800m and 4:18 mile in HS and received a preferred walk-on offer at MAC school. He could not make grades at the Big 10 schools. I don't think ever ran in a meet or made it through a semester at the school, before returning to his small town to find a job. I remember a few years after he graduated HS, he took second place to an Olympian in a local competitive 5K running 14 something, almost gunning him in the last half mile.

I've never had a conversation with him, but I'd love to ask him about his life and why he didn't continue at the college and elite level .

i knew a kid who ran 4 09 1600 but was hooked on cheetos. never ran again after college. i hear he's over 300 lbs now, working at a Walmart in Pittsburg.

perryx wrote:

SDSU Aztec wrote:

It's difficult to believe a runner would turn down a scholarship. Do you have any examples of ones that did?

Lukas V walked away from a scholarship at Oregon after 2 races to pursue a triathlon career.

He was quite the outlier. Without the accident, he probably would have returned to college within a year and been back on scholarship with Oregon or another school.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

vespy wrote:

The list of runners who did nothing in college is pretty long, especially for girls. How many races did Sarah Baxter, Amber Trotter, Katelyn Kaltenbach or Chelsey Sveinsson run? Injuries or other issues ended their running careers early. But how many top runners just made the decision after high school not to compete at the next level even though the opportunities were there for them?

It's difficult to believe a runner would turn down a scholarship. Do you have any examples of ones that did?

I have seen it a lot with female athletes. Have their heart set on U. of Washington or UCLA or Cal Berkeley or U. of Michigan or U. of WI-Madison. Schools like those listed, flagship large public universities, power five conference schools make no offer, teenagers still may attend those schools. Ignore offers from say Central Washington, Cal State-Northridge, U. of WI-Milwaukee, Minnesota State-Mankato or U of IL-Chicago.

Jalapeno wrote:

Fastest high school kids who never ran a step again after finishing high school? (Ie never ran in college competitively or anything else to do with the sport even though they had the talent )

Without naming any names name your examples.

This was the year 2000 so couple decades ago. We had a guy on my team who was a dickhead. I think he ran 4:22 in the mile and was recruited at a d1. He was a real idiot (for a pickup speeding through school parking lot burning tires), but he had decent leg speed.

There was another guy in my conference who ran a 910 3200m and went to a university in Florida and got hooked on drugs and he never competed again

Those are just some examples off the top of my head

Sham69

The Narwhal wrote:

There was a kid in the Midwest, Illinois, I think, that was a legit talent. Sub-9 3200M and very low 4:00's for the 1600M. He went to college on athletic scholarship, a top 10 XC ranked school, but I don't think he ever competed collegiately.

10/10 but he does make YouTube videos and has lots of threads on LetsRun

First name starts with a K and last name with an S. Not sure why we can't name names, though.

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=5740377

There was a kid at a school close to where I live. He was all-state in cross country all four years (finishing top 10), ran 9:30ish in the 3200 as a freshman, and was consistently among the best in the state. His senior year, he got second at state cross country and second in the 3200, and he won the 1600. He ran like 15:30, 9:17, 4:19. In a local news article, after winning the 1600, he said he was over running and that was his last race. I don't think he has competed since then (this is over 10 years ago).

You just described my son except 10 years too early.

Here's an article on him:

https://globegazette.com/sports/state_track/algonas-mcmahon-wins-first-title/article_24dbd958-8403-11e0-9203-001cc4c002e0.html

I just looked up results quick. He had the following state meet finishes.

XC: 3, 3, 4, 2

3200: 2, 3, 4, 2

1600: Didn't run it as a freshman (but his slower twin brother got 6th), 5, 4, 1

Best times were 15:31 on the state course, 9:17, 4:19...ran 15:53 on the state course and 9:34 as a freshman in the 3200. Sounds like a kid with great talent who probably just wasn't that into it.

Not saying his name like you asked, but there was a kid who was legendary, ran 14:20s as a sophmore, won the state meet in a large state in the 3200. But then he got an arranged marriage and never competed in college. He did run some steps after high school, but for only recreation, like hopping into a 6 mile race long after his prime and averaging 4:42 pace. Also, he famously ran to save a woman being assaulted, and was praised as a Good Samaritan.

Yong-Sung Leal

Knew a girl who was individual state XC champ all 4 years of HS and dominated several track events. Small school classification but was still offered at the D1 school of her choice where she would have been a low to mid-pack talent with low high school mileage. She wanted to be a sorority girl though and not a runner.

Stephanie Jenks, also from Iowa, is the best female runner ever to not run in college. She was a 4 time NXN qualifier and 3 time Footlocker qualifier. She ran 4:25 for 1500 and 9:24 3k.

There was a kid in high school who started running his junior year. He ended up with around a 4:20 mile and 1:55 800 with minimal training.

He was built more like a runner, around 5'10" and 150, but he was the starting Quarterback and Point Guard on two good teams. He was the most natural athlete I've ever seen. I think he just stopped playing sports after high school. though he may have tried walking on a D1 basketball team.

If he had dedicated himself to running, he could have been so good.

Elijah Claiborne of Northport NY, 1:50 800m on his teams national champion 4x8, state champion in the 800m,1600m,4x8 at the NY state meet his senior year. both him and his brother committed to penn state but he only ran a handful of races before getting kicked off of the team.

also from northport same graduating class, Dan O'Connor, he ran 1:55, 4:17, 9:17, 15:42(xc) cant find anything on him running in college I'm pretty sure he just stopped running

fdasfadsf wrote:

There was a kid at a school close to where I live. He was all-state in cross country all four years (finishing top 10), ran 9:30ish in the 3200 as a freshman, and was consistently among the best in the state. His senior year, he got second at state cross country and second in the 3200, and he won the 1600. He ran like 15:30, 9:17, 4:19. In a local news article, after winning the 1600, he said he was over running and that was his last race. I don't think he has competed since then (this is over 10 years ago).

His decision to not run in college seems rational. Improving from 9:30 to 9:17 over 3 years would be extremely frustrating.

especially when he had 2 guys on his team that were just as fast when younger but went on to be national-level runners

STEVE THE ADDICT^^^^^^""""-""""--'-"--^'

No one wants to grow old and have high school being the time of their life, that's kind of depressing.

Yeah when they could instead go onto spending their adult live trolling and spewing nonsense conspiracy theories anonymously on a crappy running website.

Your story is so much more uplifting. if they could only have dreamed and Achieved like you!