Adam Niemi/Staff Reporter

I’m convinced that the Central Michigan track and field long-distance runners could outrun Twitter trends.

A recent trend: CMU track and field distance shattering records.

There are three reasons to watch track and field this season:

1. Let’s be serious — the basketball program is not good at all. Lately their games remind me of The Hangover. After the game, I’m left wondering what the hell just happened.
   And word on the street is that Trey Zeigler’s bricks from all his missed free throws will be used to build the new graduate housing facility on north campus.
2. The long-distance runners on the current team are among the Chippewas best ever. Seven records have been set by distance runners, indoor and outdoor, since 2007. That’s including three this season – two in the past eight days. That’s not including sprints or field events.
   Two of the recent records include sophomore distance runner Tecumseh Adams, who set his second CMU record in as many weeks. On Friday, he set a record in the 3k with a time of 8:02.39.
   The week before he set a 5k record at the University of Indiana with a time of 13:53.08, the first time a CMU runner finished that race in under 14 minutes.
   Senior distance runner Holly Anderson also set a 5k record Friday with a time of 16:49.93.
   Don’t forget Josh Kettlewell, the senior multi-event athlete who shattered the previous heptathlon record by over 300 points. Track and field athletes are purely breaking records almost faster than it can be recorded.
3. Track and field is one of the few sports where athletes are encouraged to focus on themselves for the good of the team. Track and field is an individual sport where being slightly selfish is part of the success. The only other sport I can think of with that kind of team structure is golf. Good luck staying awake for that. The blasts of the gun to start each race will keep you awake and alert the whole time.
   Oh, and you ever see someone pole vault 17 feet? That’s first floor to the second floor of the library, but don’t try it.

Basketball games are a marathon. Or a boxing match, if you prefer women’s games.

Anderson, senior distance runner, set a 5k record with a time of 16:49.93.

“(Assistant) coach (Matt) Kaczor was excited about the record,” Anderson said. “But neither of us were happy about the race.”

Anderson said she aimed to run in the low 16:40′s.

“There were some parts where I didn’t make moves that I should have,” she said.

Sophomore distance runner Adams set a 3k record with a time of 8:02.39.

Three distance records have been set so far this season – two in the past eight days.

Anderson said the 5k time is also her personal record by about 20 seconds. She said the personal record, or PR, is an authoritative mark of success.

“PR is really exciting because you put so much work into getting them,” Anderson said. “The races are really a culmination of what you do all day every day, so it’s really the best indicator.”

Senior thrower Kevin Mays set a career-best weight throw Friday in Findlay, Ohio with a distance of 67-06.25. Although his first five throws were foul, Mays said he didn’t lose confidence because the foul throws were as far as he’s thrown all season.

“The level of competition helped me focus,” Mays said. “I didn’t want to embarrass myself or my team.”

Nike-sponsored professional thrower A.G. Krueger threw the best distance of 80-11.75. Mays and Krueger both competed in the elite section of the weight throw.

In the other weight throw section, senior Ryan McCullough and sophomore Calvin Jackson both finished third and fourth respectively. McCullough threw 60-01.75, and Jackson threw 57-11.

Mays said he has high confidence going into the week and upcoming meets, but still must focus on fundamentals. Weight throwing requires a fine touch and repetition like a pitcher in baseball, he said.

“I think that’s the most important thing for me is to focus on my technique and my control,” Mays said.

At Notre Dame, sophomore Ross Parsons finished eleventh in the 60-meter dash with a time of 6.93.

Freshman Lucas Bade finished fifth in the 500-meter with a time of 1:04.43.

The photo, taken during a team huddle at the end of the 2009 track and field Mid-American Conference championship, is clogged with arms and hands. Central Michigan director of track and field, Randolph, pointed around the photo and listed the names of the athletes’ hands and arms reaching from every direction to the center of the team.

Randolph said he takes the same eye for detail he uses to recognize those in an old photo, to watching his players in practice and prepare strategies for them to pursue in upcoming meets, like this weekend at Findlay and Notre Dame.

It is also the first major adjustment for the team, Randolph said, as they prepare for the first pair of meets against high-level competition as a complete team. The sprint, jump and distance athletes will travel to Notre Dame for the Meyo Invitational Friday afternoon.

Throwers will travel to Findlay, Ohio for the Findlay Open the same day.

“You pay attention to the little things that make big things happen,” Randolph said.

He said this is the part of the season when it is important for athletes to sharpen and maintain their focus ahead of the championship meets.

“The biggest thing is the focus, attitude and execution,” Randolph said, who emphasizes that those three elements factor as importantly as actual performance.

Senior thrower Kevin Mays said professional throwers, like A.G. Kreuger, will also compete in Findlay in a meet he considers the biggest so far this season.

“This is a pretty big weekend for us,” Mays said. “Findlay is a D-II school, but they have the invite section, so the competition will be tough. It’s going to feel like a national meet because of the level of competition.”

Two reached those goals.

At the Penn State National Saturday, senior multi-event athlete Josh Kettlewell won the seven-event heptathlon with a career-high score of 5,673, which broke a CMU 13-year record.

“He set the multi record, that’s for sure,”  assistant coach Matt Kaczor said. “With all the work he’s put in, it’s nice to see the rewards.”

The score was 300 points higher than both the runner-ups Saturday, and the previous CMU record. The record was set in 1998 by Nathan Parker.

Kettlewell won the 60 meter hurdles with a personal-best time of 8.33. He also finished fourth in the 1000 meter run with a time of 2:42. He marked 16-10.75 in the pole vault.

At Indiana, sophomore distance runner Tecumseh Adams also set a school record Saturday.

He finished second place in the 5k event with a time of 13:53.08 in Bloomington, Ind. He said Thursday he was aiming for a sub-fourteen minute race to give him a good chance of qualifying for the NCAA Championship in March.

It was the first 5k under 14 minutes in CMU history.

The 5k automatic qualifier for the NCAA Championship is 13:44. The top-17 runners in the nation are selected. Adams said he will not know for a while his time qualifies.

“My time might make it in,” he said. “I have a pretty good chance. Last year, my time was the final spot (in the championship).”

Coach Kaczor, who traveled with Adams to Indiana, said the drive there was not a problem.

“We try to keep it as simple as possible,” he said. “When we got there, you could see his nerves a little bit about a half-hour before the race, but I just reminded him he’s been training for it.”

Adams said during the race, there was a “rabbit,” a runner who leads and sets the pace. It helped him settle into a pace. He averaged 4:27 per mile.

He said his techniques to stay focused in the race include studying other runners’ shoes and jerseys.

“It really helped me to have the rabbit pull me along,” Adams said. “The last three minutes I was struggling, but I focused on the techniques I talked about before to stay in it.”

Kaczor said the team can do nothing but work harder than it has before.

“You just got to keep moving forward,” he said. “Like I told Tec, ‘You won and you have a day to celebrate, then it’s back to work.’ When you run well like that, people know you the next time you run, you have to keep working.”

He reads the brand names on opponents’ jerseys, or the colors of the shoes they wear.

“Sometimes when I’m running, I’ll study people’s shoes or jerseys to take my mind off the amount of laps we have to do,” Adams said.

Adams, a sophomore distance runner on the CMU track and field team, won an individual Mid-American Conference championship in cross-country last fall.

He will compete today at the Indiana Relays at the University of Indiana for a spot in the 5k event in the NCAA Indoor Championship in March.

“I’m feeling pretty good,” Adams said. “My training has been good.”

Adams took a week off between the cross-country and track and field seasons. He said he is aiming to finish with a time around 13:50, which is about 20 seconds faster than his personal best.

“Most of the guys I was running with in cross were sub-14 runners,” he said. “And I’ve always been a pretty good track runner.”

Adams said he has spoken repeatedly with assistant coach Matt Kaczor about his race strategy.

“Me and my coach, Kaczor, have been talking about times, and where I should be at different parts of the race,” he said. “My coach is basically saying to follow the leaders within reaching distance, and not get separated.”

Apart from Adams, the Central Michigan men’s and women’s track and field teams will be intentionally limited by director of track and field and cross-country Willie Randolph.

Randolph said the team is at its point in the season where it bears down on fundamentals to prepare for a run at a MAC championship.

“If we can relax ourselves and focus on the things we have to do, the execution will come a whole lot easier,” Randolph said.

Among the 15 competing athletes this weekend are senior multi-event athlete Josh Kettlewell and sophomore multi-event athlete Tim Reynolds, who will both compete at the Penn State National today and Saturday in College Station, Penn.

It will be Kettlewell’s and Reynold’s first multi-event meets of the season.

Randolph said he has no concern about the athletes performing without the company and support of their teammates.

“It’s a bunch of basketball and football games,” Randolph said about track and field as a sport. “You can’t stop and take a timeout. It’s always going on – it’s happening.”

The Chippewas competition included Michigan, Eastern Michigan and Detroit Mercy.

Senior multi-event athlete Josh Kettlewell set a personal best in pole vault with a 17-01 vault. He nearly matched the indoor pole vault record of 17-06.

Despite the women’s event went unscored, both CMU teams provided strong performances, with 10 top-five finishes out of 16 events.

Senior thrower George Flanner finished first in the shot-put with a distance of 51-00.25. Senior thrower Kevin Mays also finished first in the weight throw event with a distance of 64-07.25.

Tecumseh Adams won the mile run for the men’s team with a time of 4:12.82, less than a second within his personal best. Senior jumper Kevin Bacon won the long jump with a distance of 21-08.25.

Some of the women’s best performances came in the 3,000 meter. Senior long-distance runner Holly Anderson finished first with a time of 9:58.17. Anderson’s teammate, sophomore long-distance runner Krista Parks, finished in third in the same event with a time of 10:16.34.

The women’s team also finished second in the 400-meter relay, with a composite time of 3:57.9.

Senior Stephanie Hurley won the 400-meter dash with a season-best time of 58.02.

The men’s and women’s track and field team will compete Friday at The Cardinal invitational in Saginaw.

“Get there, get by them,” the director of track and field, Randolph, yelled along with his assistant coach, Kaczor.

That was Friday, when the Central Michigan men’s and women’s track and field teams both finished in first place over Detroit Mercy, Oakland University, Macomb Community College and Aquinas College.

Randolph and Kaczor know it’s another season to aim for a Mid-American Conference championship. They know that the seniors have one final chance at a title.

For Holly Anderson, it’s her last chance.

Anderson, a senior long-distance runner, said she wants a MAC championship before she leaves CMU in May.

Also a cross-country runner, Anderson and the cross-country team came in second place at the MAC championships in the fall for the second-straight year.

The women’s track and field team finished in fourth during the MAC championships in May 2010. The last MAC title in either indoor or outdoor was 2004.

The last chance for Anderson, the cross-country runners and the rest of the track and field team has arrived. Anderson is one of four seniors from the cross-country team running track and field.

“I’m really excited,” Anderson said. “It was a really great winter of training.”

She finished first in the one-mile run Friday with at time of 5:04.86. Senior runner Veronica Garcia finished in third place with a time of 5:17.88.

Anderson said running long-distance track and field is a lot different from cross-country.

“There’s not the time (in track and field) like you have in a cross-country race,” she said.

She said the strategy differs between cross-country and distance track because of the shorter amount of time. A mile run in track and field, she said, feels more like a sprint.

Kaczor said the team is progressing, but still saw things he said were “far from perfect.” He also expected to see some rust in the first meet of the season.

“They ran really well, but it’s the beginning of January, so you have to take it with a grain of salt,” Kaczor said.

Despite the imperfections he and Randolph observed, there’s an overriding reason they cheer on the runners with so much energy.

“These kids pour their heart and soul into the track,” Kaczor said. “How can you not support them when they put so much work into what they do?”

At least it has for Central Michigan pole vaulter Josh Kettlewell.

Josh Kettlewell

The men’s track and field senior is tied for eighth in the nation with Virginia Tech’s Joe Davis in the pole vault event.

“If you would have told me I would have been this successful when I was a freshman I would have laughed in your face,” Kettlewell said.

Kettlewell is a multi-event participator. He has participated in heptathlons, decathlons, 4×4 400m relay, 60m hurdles and most importantly the pole vault.

“It is really hard for a collegiate athlete to have a lot of talent and then to mentally take advantage of their talent,” said assistant coach Bobby Wilson.

Last season Josh separated his shoulder in the first outdoor meet, restricting him from participation for the remainder of the season.

“It was really frustrating, no one wants to have to limit themselves because of an injury,” Kettlewell said.

Now, fully recovered, Kettlewell is at the top of his game. He posted a career-best vault of 16-8.75 at the Grand Valley State University Early Bird event. That stands as the eighth best vault in the nation this year.

It took hard work to get back from injury to posting career bests.

“He is always the first one to practice and the last one to leave,” Wilson said. “He knows what I want, when I want it, and he is willing to work his butt off to get it.”

His hard work may be one of the reasons CMU named Kettlewell one of the captains to this year’s team.

“This is his first year of being a captain, he is 100 percent our leader,” Wilson said.  “He has become the leader everyone has wanted him to be.”

Kettlewell hopes his work ethic will help to motivate his teammates. He said he wasn’t always the most talented, but worked hard enough to earn his position and in the nation’s top-10 pole vaulters.

“I think I have always been a leader,” Kettlewell said. “I may not have been the most vocal person, but I do think I’ve always led by example.”

The sophomore is the first CMU All-American since 2009 when Greg Pilling achieved the honor, also competing in the discus.

“It means so much to me to finally earn All-American status, being so close last year,” Rose said. “There is only one guy returning that placed ahead of me, so my main goal is (to) get in (a) position where he can’t beat me.”

Both the men and women finished well throughout the season. They had athletes achieving personal best performances every week, four school records fell and the men had their best finish in the Mid-American Conference since 2005.

The men had a young team, but still finished third in the MAC Outdoor Championships. They will lose seven seniors from this season, but out of the 21 events the Chippewas competed in this season, only two season-best scores were held by seniors.

“The men had the highest conference ranking since 2005 with 90 of their points coming from underclassmen and the first All-American since 2009,” said track and field director Willie Randolph.“We had a lot of good steps and we’re heading in the right direction.”

The women had a more experienced team with plenty of veteran leadership, which helped with the young talent brought in since the arrival of Randolph and his staff. However, only seven seniors had season-best scores for CMU.

“We took some gradual steps this year,” Randolph said. “The women had a lot of positive individual accomplishments this season with three new school records.”

The program saw a lot of achievements with academics, seeing 20 student athletes achieve Academic All-MAC and All-MAC honorable mentions for their work both on and off the track during the indoor season, and more sure to come for the outdoor.

Senior thrower Whitney Johnson was honored with the Wilma Rudolph Student Athlete Achievement Award given to those who overcome personal, academic or emotional odds to achieve academic and athletic accomplishments. She was one of only six athletes nationwide to receive the award this year.