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Loss doesn't detract from season June 6, 2004 By LOWELL COHN THE PRESS DEMOCRAT SACRAMENTO Disappointment is part of it, too. J.K. Withers of Cardinal Newman High School hoped he'd win the 1,600-meter run at the state meet. And he had reason to hope. He came into the weekend with the fourth-best time this season in all of California, and he has the best 1,600-meter time in the history of the Empire. He'll go to Oregon next fall on a track scholarship. A runner who's accomplished things like that has prospects. On Friday he'd qualified for the final with a dramatic, go-for-broke dash at the very end, gobbling up runners in front of him. But it was different on Saturday. First off, he woke up early, way too early. He forgot to shut the blinds in his hotel room and at 6 a.m. he got the sun full in the face. He staggered out of bed to close the blinds but never got back to sleep -- it was light, the room was hot. Not that he was making excuses. It's just that the day never felt right. He arrived at the track about 2 o'clock and went through his warm-ups -- he's meticulous about things like that, runs something like 60 miles a week. Shortly after 5 p.m., when the shadows began to lengthen, the starter shot off the gun and the runners took off. Well, to say they took off is an exaggeration. The pace was slow, excruciatingly slow. That happens sometimes in the 1,600, no one wanting to take the lead, no one wanting to waste his energy while someone hangs on his hip and breezes to the front later on. The pace didn't bother Withers. He knows he has speed and he thought he'd out-kick the competition at the end. That was his strategy. So he ran in the middle of the pack lap after lap. Not in the lead, but not trailing by much. He was all potential. And then the crucial moment came in the race, as it always does. Everyone hit the far turn and about half a lap remained and the runners in front of Withers began to pull away. At a certain moment he knew he was through. "This sucks," he said to himself. And it did. Withers' coach Pat La Fortune saw the critical moment, saw his runner tighten up. La Fortune said to himself, when a runner, a really good runner understands he can't win, he sometimes slows down. The runner doesn't mean to slow down. He just does. And maybe that happened to Withers. He felt his back tighten up in the last 300 yards and it never had done that before. Someone passed him at the end. He came in next to last. It was a horrifying last half lap. He walked slowly to the grass infield and took deep breaths and kneeled down and stared at the ground. He had thought he could win, had visualized coming in first, and now this. He drank some water, then spit on the grass. Coach La Fortune walked over. La Fortune was smiling. "You went after it," he said to Withers. "This doesn't detract from a great great season." Withers listened to his coach. La Fortune smiled again. "Sometimes the body just doesn't respond," he said. "That's why you race." It was an important moment between athlete and coach. And La Fortune was doing the right thing by smiling. Or as he told someone, "Our job as coach when they're really down is to get them through that." La Fortune reminded Withers what a strong runner he is. La Fortune reminded him he'd represented Cardinal Newman with dignity. La Fortune reminded him he'll be back in Sacramento next weekend in the very same stadium for the Golden West Meet. La Fortune reminded him his girlfriend was waiting outside the stadium. In other words, the coach gave the kid perspective. Life goes on.
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