First of all, I would like to congratulate all of the Northern California teams and individuals on their successes at the California Interscholastic Federation State Championships. It was a very historic day, one that we all should be proud of.
Before the message board and personal messaging trolling gets out of hand (our team has already received its fair share of bashing before we even got home), I would like to mention a couple of things about my experience and hope that we all can support each other.
I want to give a major congratulations to the boys team of St. Francis of Mountain View for their win yesterday. It was a tremendous honor to have raced them and be a part of the most historic clash of CCS versus NCS teams in the history of the State Meet. Our team had talked about racing them and knew it was going to take a perfect race on our part to be able to beat them. They were clearly the better team and deserve all of the praise and accolades that they receive and I am very excited to see them represent our area at NXN. I also have to second a previous post by Bellarmine coach Patrick McCrystle about the class of this team. After our race, their entire team and coaching staff came over and congratulated our team and did it in a very humble manner. I truly appreciate this gesture. They have gained a huge Lancer fan this weekend and I wish them the very best at NXN.
I am extremely proud of our Dublin team and the successes they've had this year. We have had many conversations about racing and one of the things we stress is that it is ok to get beat, but it is not ok to lose. There is a difference. At State, St. Francis just flat out beat us. We didn't lose that race. To be honest, had we even run what I thought we were capable of, I don't think we would have won. We tip our cap to St. Francis on a job well done. It took the greatest team in CCS history to take us down and I told our boys that was nothing to be ashamed of. Moreover, we still became the first NCS team in over a decade to make the podium in Division II. How can you be upset at that?
I'm saying all of this because these are just kids we are talking about and I am getting rather tired of the trolling that goes on about not just my student athletes, but everyone's. It's disgusting that "anonymous" gets to say whatever they want without having to toe the line in the shoes of these fine and outstanding young people. Support our student athletes in a positive manner and understand that what they read does affect them. We are all human and can't just shake it off.
Again, congrats to everyone on a great State meet.
Chris Williams
Dublin High School
8 comments:
Thank you, coach Williams. It was great watching your team this year and you have much to be proud of. It is no wonder your boys race and act with the class they do. You, coach McCrystle, coach Pompei, and many others are the reason why our sport attracts the type of quality individuals it does. The respect and care for fellow competitors that you expressed, and that I see on a weekly basis, is truly impressive. What a great time to be a fan of NorCal distance running!
We have all been watching the Dublin accomplishments and the Dublin / St. Francis / Bellarmine battles all season. This was cross country at its best. This was NorCal cross country at its best. Congratulations Coach Williams and team and St. Francis and Bellarmine for competing with composure all season long and for showing composure when it's hard to do. You battled and represented not only every Saturday but today as well. Much respect for the 2017 Dublin, St. Francis, Bellarmine squads.
And congratulations to the Sir Francis Drake boys for a tremendous season as well.
Congrats to the Oakland Technical team and Caroline Garrett! When was the previous best performance by an OAL team? They should be tougher next year returning everyone!
Congrats coach Williams! I was hoping Dublin would take down the private school, but it wasn’t to be! Historic season for Dublin! Congrats to all of the NorCal runners... it was a great experience for many of these kids just to qualify and run in the state meet.
Thank you Coach Chris, Patrick and Car...And BEST WISHES to Pompeis & the boys at NXN (including Anderson & Strangio) and the others at FL!!! GO NORCAL XC & TRACK TEAM!!! Wowzah!!!
Very well said Coach. The mutual respect I saw amongst the runners and coaches (Disclosure, I work with MileSplit and take pictures and interview a lot of the runners/coaches) yesterday make me proud of this sport. I was around the finish line and awards tent most of the day, so talked to every individual winner, many of the winning teams and several coaches. I was incredibly impressed with Rylee Bowen, who despite all of her previous success acted like someone who had won their first race ever, but also being gracious and encouraging to all of her fellow competitors. Claudia Lane who is as close to a "rock star" at this level, took dozens of pics with fellow competitors and is just a class individual. I spoke to some of the boys from Cathedral and you just knew this was a dream come true to them. I really appreciate all the work Albert puts in to this to cover the sport we love and I am still buzzing from all the incredible performances yesterday.
Coach Williams...class act.
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