NTN Results

They posted results and showed Naperville winning by two points. They have since taken down those results so I\'m not sure.

They are trying not to let the results out before the awards ceremony because NSSF wants it to be a surprise for everyone.

There are a bunch of videos on RunnerSpace of the race, finish, and interviews.

http://www.runnerspace.com/profile.php?do=videos&member_id=381

derrick ran(coasted) behind Lowe for first 2.5 miles then pushed the last 1000 over someone whose supposed to be a kicker!!! It was over with 300 left. Derrick will win Nationals=Illinois#1!!! Yes German will lose!

I am from Illinois too and FL Nationals is going to be a battle. It's great having state pride and all, but German crushed Puskedra today after using the same race strategy as Derrick. I can't wait for these two guys to battle next weekend! High school distance running needs this!

The guy from Uhah cruised onced they seperated from the pack at 2 miles. Derrick beat a guy who's a 3 times national footlocker qualifier!! Also Derrick has run 5 raced over the last month! Derrick is brave to try such a thing and try to win ntionals too? Long season? Hell yeh!! I hope he can finish it off with fashion!!!

225 marathon guy wrote:

The guy from Uhah cruised onced they seperated from the pack at 2 miles. Derrick beat a guy who's a 3 times national footlocker qualifier!! Also Derrick has run 5 raced over the last month! Derrick is brave to try such a thing and try to win ntionals too? Long season? Hell yeh!! I hope he can finish it off with fashion!!!

I believe that Steve Murdock had something like 8 hard ass races in the last 9 weeks, and 7 hard races in a row.. and he had at least one footlocker finalist in every race.

Derrick may have ran a faster time than Murdock did last year, but the conditions this year were a shit load better, and he didn't have any competition. He won his race by I think 11 or 12 seconds.

Derrick is a great runner, but he isn't any better than the runners from last year.

Ih... no offense to Murdock, he is a great runner and a fellow NYer, but Derrick is far and away better than he was last year. He was good last year, ran a legendary series of races and came really close to running away with nationals, but Derrick (as well as several other runners) are on a different level this year.

Absolutely NOT!!

RFXCrunner wrote:

Ih... no offense to Murdock, he is a great runner and a fellow NYer, but Derrick is far and away better than he was last year. He was good last year, ran a legendary series of races and came really close to running away with nationals, but Derrick (as well as several other runners) are on a different level this year.

How can you possibly say that Derrick is "far and way" better than Murdock?

So what you're saying is that Derrick, is a better runner than Craig Forys, Matt Centrowitz, Hall, Mead, Elliot Heath, etc? All these guys Murdock either beat or got close to doing, with a harder schedule than Derrick?

Can you please explain to me how he is so much better? They have ran against different type of runners, last year everyone went out slow, looking for the win, not time, and this year everyone is trying to run away from each other. To me, last year was a group of smarter runners, in college you have to be within yourself or you will get swallowed by everyone.

Now I'm not trying to say that Murdock is a better runner than Chris Derrick, I'm just saying that Chris isn't any better than Murdock.

I also wanted to add that there is no way in hell that Chris has as big of balls than Murdock did last year, the kid was the best competitor out there... There is no way that he would have let Derrick just run away from him, it would have had to be a battle to the end.

You're right. Murdoch and his graduating class did a fine job this year in college cross. We'll check back in a year and we'll see how well German and Chris do their fresman year in cross. I'm bet Murdoch never beats Chris in XC ever.

Hmm... I thought I put a response in here, but it isn't showing up. I don't feel like retyping it, so I'll summarize:

Don't get me wrong, Murdock was incredibly impressive last season. You can't really compare track times, as Murdock didn't have an outdoor season his senior year, and Derrick has yet to have an senior year in track. However, Derrick was far faster as a junior.

Thus far this season, Derrick has lost one race, where he let another guy take the win at FLMW because he had NTN the next weekend. Murdock did not ease up in his regional and took 4th. Derrick has been running away from fields all year, including a huge win at his state meet in an 8 second course record over a previous FLN champion (and even further ahead of at least one other FLN champion, as well as several other standouts). His time at the meet was 13:52 for a 3 mile race, on pace for a ~14:26 5k. Murdock, during indoor, ran a 5k on the track in a little under 14:40. At NTN, Derrick took apart a 3X Footlocker qualifier who had gone undefeated thus far this season, as well as beating the top returner from FLN last year by over 40 seconds.

And on a bigger note, I think this years class of XC runners is, simply put, faster than last years. No disrespect to the runners last year, but I think there will be 3 or more people who beat last years winning time at FLN. Murdock has an incredibly consistent, incredibly gutsy 2 months last fall, but Derrick is a better XC runner this year than Murdock was last year. In a few more days, we'll be able to see just how good this years runners are, but I think if you were to take last years runners and put them in this years race, the defending champ would probably finish between 3rd and 5th. Murdock would still be in the top 10, but I doubt he would have made top 5. Again, we'll know better in a week.

I don't give him any crap for not having a great XC season- he is coming off a pretty long injury in his first collegiate season. I know firsthand that isn't easy, I think he could turn into an All-American type runner over the next few years.

Also note, I never said he was better than Forys, Mead, Centro, or anything like that. I do, however, think he is a better XC runner at this point in his career. I don't know if he'll match the accomplishments those other runners have had since then, but you would be pretty naive to think Derrick isn't at least equal to them as seniors during XC.

Fun fact :

Derrick was a commentator at some of the nxn races