Runnin’ Down a Dream

By Will Johnson

Messenger Reporter

ELKHART – Perfection. Webster’s Dictionary defines the word as, “An unsurpassable degree of accuracy or excellence.” It doesn’t occur very often and very seldom does it happen in the world of athletic competition.

At the high school level, athletic perfection is as rare as a unicorn. Excellent and very good are ray-stanfielddefinite possibilities but as far as perfection, there are way too many variables to take into account. Homework, girl/boyfriend issues, hormones, and teen angst work against it on a daily basis.

Latexo ISD, however, has a new athletic director who knows a thing or two about perfection in the world of cross country running as 2016 marks the 15th anniversary of a team’s run at perfection under the tutelage of Latexo AD Ray Stanfield.

In 2001, Coach Stanfield’s Canton Eagles ran the perfect race at the regional cross country meet and notched a perfect score. A perfect score is 15 and occurs when runners from a school finish 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. The top five runners from each team add up their places and that is the team score.

Prior to the Elkhart Cross Country meet held on Wed
nesday, Sept. 28, Coach Stanfield discussed the anniversary. “In 2001, it had never been done and of course we won state that year. It’s also the 20 year anniversary of the team I had at Corrigan that won the region. I started cross country there and we won regionals in my second year,” he said.

“That was a heckuva a team I had there in Canton. We scored the lowest points ever in the history of the state meet but that’s been broken since then by South Lake Carroll. We only scored 31 points,” the coach added.

The perfect score occurred at a regional meet “… and was the most incredible thing. There are only four regions in the state. Ty (Stanfield – Coach Stanfield’s son) was the defending state champ so we knew no one could run with him. We also had a really good number two guy and I told them before the meet, I thought we could put all five in the top 20. To go one through five, though, that’s just incredible. Everywhere I go, people will tell me ‘I was there that day Canton went one through five.’ It’s pretty neat. I can’t believe it was 15 years ago.”

Asked what it took to motivate runners to go above and beyond what they felt they were capable of, Coach Stanfield explained, “I think as long as I’ve been doing this – I played basketball and baseball in college but I didn’t run track. I’ve won two state championships as a football coach in high school, so I understand a lot about this, but the hardest thing to do in athcross-countryletics, I think, is to get a distance runner ready to run fast when he’s supposed to run fast. You start training these guys in June and you have meets all along the season, but have to get ready to run fast in November or October whenever your regional meet is held.”

Stanfield added, “A lot of it has to do with natural ability, but those guys in Canton were not that good the year before. Bringing in the state champion from the year before, well, that upped the workout. Their mindset seemed to be, ‘Now we get to train with the best guy in the state every day.’  I think it was just a matter of understanding of when to run fast at the right time, not to peak too early and not to do speed work too early and not to be dead on race days.”

The times for the Canton Eagles at the 2000-01 state cross country meet and the order in which they finished are listed below:

  • Ty Stanfield, Canton, 15:45
  • Joe Barrentine, Canton, 16:25
  • Kevin Green, Canton, 16:40
  • Brian Green, Canton, 16:50
  • Ryan Stone, Canton, 17:12

The Latexo Tigers finished second as a team in the Elkhart meet and the Lady Tigers finished sixth as a team. It’s a safe bet to look for Coach Jessica Cutshall’s team, along with the assistance of Coach Stanfield, to start running down that dream of perfection in the very near future.

Will Johnson may be contacted via e-mail at [email protected].

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