Patrick Brown's Senior Salute

Questions 1: What was your greatest moment while competing in high school? 

Two moments come to mind for me, both during my Junior year. The first was when I dropped 17 seconds in the 3200 during the indoor regional race causing me to place third and advance to my first state meet. The second was my outdoor districts championship race where before the race my coach approached me and my other two teammates running the race and told us that we were down by ten points and we needed to score, and I told him that I planned on winning, and then I did and my team mate Emil and I broke 10 in the 3200 that same race.

Question 2: What is your biggest regret (related to T&F in high school) or what would you have done differently and why?

My freshman year I did not plan on doing track. But after spending the indoor season not running I realized how much I missed running and joined the team for the outdoor track season. I regret that I missed out on an entire season of training and can only imagine what I would have achieved if I had committed myself to the sport earlier. 

Question 3: What will you miss the most about HS T&F/XC?

I will miss my team. Showing up to practice every day has been a constant in my life for the past four years, and I close to some of my favorite people as a result. I will do my best to come back and visit the team, but the sense of comradery felt by competing with those people against the same field will be gone. 

Question 4: What is some advice from incoming frosh and rising seniors on your high school team that you would like to share with them?

It really wasn't until my senior year that I started taking track super seriously, but I would say this: If you really want to, you can be a great runner. All it takes is getting the maximum possible benefit from each run you do. That means not walking in between reps, pushing yourself on the tempos, and always doing the cooldowns. I would also suggest doing lots of core work.

Question 5: What was the hardest workout you did your entire high school career? Did you like it or did you dread it?

The workouts I would always dread the most were 1. Anytime it was windy and 2. Anytime I had to do any 800s. The workouts I like the most were the 4 mile tempo runs and the 90 minute long runs.

Question 6: How did you make track/XC a very individual sport into more of a team sport?

I feel like what makes track/XC a team sport is all the inside jokes that makes the team cohesive. The fact that no one on any other team will know what I mean when I reference Kyle saying "But she's rich right?" Liam saying "It's made of Ragnaroks" or Chris and Nuns make the team dynamic unlike any other group of which I have ever been a part.   

Question 7: Finally, what are your college plans? Will you be competing in college, where? What do you plan on studying? What do you have as career plans?