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Hello everybody! I guess I should start off by introducing myself. My name is Ed McDaniel.
I am now a senior at Oak Forest High School, a 2A school located in the south-suburbs of Chicago.
I love it here and I wouldn't pick any program over ours. This will be our 2nd year racing at the 2A level.
 | Ed McDaniel
as a Freshman
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Overall, high school cross country has been a blast. I feel like I've been in every
situation and I have a lot to say. I know what its like to run in the open race all
season. I know what its like being an under-classman trying to break into the
varsity top 7 and earn All-Conference. Now I know what its like to be a returning
all-stater in a position, trying to have the best senior year possible.
Running has completely changed my life.
 | Ed McDaniel and Josh Driver
celebrate another Oak Forest win
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Before running, I was just some geeky skateboarder who could barely run a 7:00 mile. My best friends are all runners. I have met some of the nicest people through the sport. I plan on doing it for the remainder of my life.
And hopefully one day I will be lucky enough to become a coach and pass the tradition on to a new generation of kids.
Last year was a fun season for both myself and the team. We accomplished things that I never imagined us doing as a freshman. Through hard work and great coaching we were able to win conference for only the 2nd time in the last
decade. Then for the first time ever in school history we won regionals & sectionals, and qualified for the IHSA State Meet. My teammate Pathik Gandhi and I earned All-State for the first time, which felt amazing.
After a somewhat satisfying, yet bummed-out ending to a track season, I got right to work over the summer.
The week of track conference I developed a hip-pointer which was an annoyance to say the least. Our 4x800 team
still managed to place 6th at state, which we were all proud of. The hip pointer kept me from running until right
around July. I had to swim, bike, and lift to stay in shape. It paid off when my friends Josh Driver, Dave Neuman,
and myself took a trip "down under" to Australia (& then Hawaii for a few days). We were fortunate enough to have
the legendary Bob Geiger as our coach! I got a personal record in the 5K, running a 15:51 and winning the All-American race. The trip was absolutely amazing. I met people that I will never forget. I still keep in touch with most of them via Facebook. July was an amazing month for me personally. I hit 75 miles, which was the most I've ever ran in a week. I felt great.
Now its the start to my senior year. There is no more "next year." Its now or never. I don't have much to say about
this season other than our team has worked very hard this summer and we will be doing our best to make an impact
at state this fall.
Hello everybody! The last two weeks have been interesting. As a team, we have had a bit of a reality check. As the season rolls on we are starting to see where we rank among 2A teams. We need to start being a bit more consistent, especially under pressure at invites.
Peoria Woodruff was a nice wake-up call, when we finished 5th place. It was cool, yet discouraging, to see the 3A guys run. Aaron Beattie finished really strong. I didn't realize how good O'Fallon's number one runner really is. Seeing those guys run around 14:45 this early gave me a bit of a reality check.
Personally, I feel like I am starting to find out "how" to race again. I am ready to PR. This past Saturday was an interesting race. We lost by a few points to DGS. My goal was to win by running the 2.75 mile course sub 14:00. I got 13:57. I almost lost the race because I let myself lose control of my thoughts. It wasnt until I was a few meters back after the mile two mark that I realized this was a race I needed to win. So for the first time this year, I feel like I finished a race very strong. I ran my last .75 in about 3:35. I found out my time would equal out to be about a 15:12 3-mile, which I was pretty content with.
I'm looking forward to racing this Saturday at the Tinley Park Invite.
Hi again! I didn't think I was going to be able to come up with something to write about this week but that has changed. Recent weather has gotten me to think more about why people run on treadmills. I am not too sure if its "worse" to run on a treadmill, but I can tell you I hate it. You will find me running outside on those harsh below zero days well before you will find me running on a treadmill. I don't know if its only me but on a treamill it seems as if every mile takes 15 minutes. I can't stand it. I've never been one to run with an iPod, so that makes running on a treadmill just that much more boring to me. Which brings me to my next argument: running with music.
I honestly can't stand running on a path and passing a runner with an iPod/MP3/whatever. This past summer I was told something along the lines of "a great runner runs to the beat of his own stride." I feel I can focus more if I concentrate on my stride. I can't hear myself think with music, and believe me, I do a lot of thinking while I run.
Thats about it for me this week. I decided to just rant about the two things that I don't like about running, I guess haha.
 Hello! This past weekend was conference. As a team I believe we did pretty well. On varsity our goal was to place all 7 of our runners in the top 10 to earn all-conference; thats what we did. Myself, Pathik Gandhi, and Alex Carey had a 1-2-3 finish. We also won the frosh/soph race with a 1-2 finish of sophomores Brandon Ivins and John Kawulia. Then our open guys, lead by champion junior Pat Stepp, took care of buisiness placing something like 14 of the top 15 spots (I believe a Lemon kid placed 6th?). Its always nice to walk away with both conference championships. This year is a bit different though; were looking past that and just focusing on whats next to do. So next week is regionals. Lets see if we can do the same thing at regionals as we did at conference! |
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