At tonight’s Virginia Challenge a slew of pros and a few college guys ran super fast on a perfect night in Charlottesville.
Wilkinson ran a 62 sec last lap to take the win in 8:18 over UVA’s Nathan Mountain (sophomore or junior) in 8:20 and pro Travis Mahoney ran 8:20 for third.
Gary Martin also running a PR in the 800, 1:47.4 earlier in the night.
Mountain's listed as a junior in the results. Wilkinson, if American, should have a chance to make the American team. Mountain's 8:20 puts him among the best young American steeplers in a long time. This appears to have been a 12 second pr from his 8:32 last year. He's run 3:58 for the mile indoors. He has found his distance.
Wilkinson is a former D3 National champ with UA Dark Sky. Ran a year for the Gophers too.
He set the 2000m Steeple record back in HS
NextNickSymmonds wrote:
Wilkinson is a former D3 National champ with UA Dark Sky. Ran a year for the Gophers too.
Wilkinson was sixth at the USATF meet last summer.
Mountain was fourth at the 2023 NCAA champs
Backinmyday wrote:
He set the 2000m Steeple record back in HS
I was just coming here to mention that.
Mountain is indeed the national HS 2000 steeple record holder with a time of 5:40 when he was a senior at St. Xavier in Ohio. He has high school PRs of 4:02.5ish for the mile, 8:42 for the 2 mile, and 14:46 5000 XC. I could be wrong but IIRC he was never the Ohio state champ in XC but was the state champ in the 1600 his senior year. The 4x800 is always an ultra competitive event in Ohio and although St X qualified for the state meet when Mountain was a senior, they were back a bit. His sophomore year he ran a leg on St. X's state 4x800 team that was runner up in 7:43.
Mountain would have made a bigger impact his freshman year at Virginia but did have some nagging injuries.