Athlete Spotlight: Sam Chick Scarborough
1. You’ve won the last 2 Class A 800m titles, outdoors in 2008 & indoors 2009. What are your goals for the 2009 Outdoor season? Do you feel any pressure to defend your title?
I would definitely like to win a third 800 title this season, who wouldn’t, but I feel like my biggest goal is to do whatever I can to best help Scarborough win the state meet, whether that be running other events in addition to the 800 or running something different all together – the team victory is my top priority. If I do run the 800 at states I feel like there will be a good deal of pressure, I know that there are a lot of guys who I’ve beaten the last two years who are eager to get another shot at the title, so a win definitely won’t come easy.
2. What are your plans for next year? Do you plan to continue your track career at the collegiate level? If so what event would you like to focus on?
Next year I’ll be attending Bowdoin College in Brunswick where I’m planning on running indoor and outdoor track. Though I’m not totally sure what Coach Slovenski has planned for me, if it were up to me though I’d like to focus on events like the 500, 600, 800 and possibly even the 400 hurdles during the outdoor season if I’m feeling adventurous.
3. You have qualified for the state meet in a variety events in your high school career, including the 110 hurdles, 300 hurdles, 800m, Triple Jump this year so far. How do you balance the training between the different events?
During a given week I’ll usually spend three or four days with the hurdle coach in addition to my regular practice and also try to get in a day or two with the jumping coach to work on my triple jump technique. It helps that the coaches are very flexible and committed to the team; otherwise I’d have a much harder time being able to train for so many different events.
4. Do you have any superstitions or rituals before meets?
I'm usually not a superstitious person but track is my one exception. I’ll never put my jersey on until just before my first event of the meet. I always retie and double knot my shoes before every race (or at least I have since I lost a shoe halfway through a race last cross-country season). I always bring the same water bottle to every meet. And during last cross-country season I always had to listen to the song “One” by Metallica on the bus ride to every meet.
I’d say this season up to this point has been a huge success. I’ve gotten some good marks in the events that I plan on running in the championship meets and I’ve managed to improve on several of my personal bests from last year’s season. I’ve definitely been strong in the hurdles where I’ve improved considerably from last year, as well as in my main events like the 800 and the 4x400. My jumps could definitely use a lot of work though, especially if I want to compete against guys at the conference and state level. As far as the team goes, I couldn’t be more impressed by how we’ve performed over the last few weeks. We returned almost our entire squad from indoors plus a number guys who played other sports during the winter and several newcomers to track who have been really outstanding during the first few meets. In Class A, I’d say the teams to beat right now are Bonny Eagle and Edward Little who have both looked very strong through the beginning of the season. The state meet is no sure thing though, and I would hope that our win last week at the Westbrook Relays has shown people that we are definitely a team to be reckoned with going into the postseason.
6. What has been your biggest accomplishment on/off the track during high school?
On the track, I’d say my biggest accomplishment has been winning the 4x800 relay at the indoor state meet during my junior year. That was a really special race for me because it was the first major event that I ever won and it showed me that I could compete with the best runners in the sport. Off the track, my proudest achievement has probably been getting accepted to college this past year. Getting into a good school is something that you really have to work at for the entire four years you’re in high school and getting accepted into your top choice, is great because it finally makes all your hard work over the years seem worth it.
7. What does a typical training week look like for you? What your favorite workout to run? How about the one you dread the most?
Depending on how many meets we have during the week, I’ll typically work out three or four times (including the meets), go on longer easy runs for two or three days, and sometimes get a day off during the weekend if I’m lucky. My favorite workouts are the speed workouts where I get to run fast 150’s, 200’s, or 400’s. They’re relatively short and I get to pretend that I’m a real sprinter, at least for a little while. As for my least favorite – 800 sims, bar none. In these workouts you run part of an 800 at race pace, run easy for part, and then finish the last 200 or 300 at race pace again. Your overall time isn’t all that fast, but you feel like you just ran an all out race by the end of it.
8. What advice would you give to younger athletes about what it takes to become a state champion? When you were an underclassmen who did you look up to on the track?
If I had to tell underclassmen one thing about track it would be this: you get out what you put in. What I mean to say is that the only way to get better at track is to work harder at it. I don’t want to sound cliché, but going to practice every day, giving 100% in workouts and races and always trying to become better is the best way to improve in track. When I was an underclassman I always looked up to the guys who always ran their hearts out every meet and I think that they really influenced me to be a better runner. One of the most exciting athletes for me to watch as an underclassmen was Brecht Moulin who always seemed to finish every race with some crazy comeback finish.
My favorite event has always been the 400 meter dash. There’s no need for strategy or pacing, all you need to do is just run one lap as fast as you possibly can. You also don’t have to be super fast, which helps me, and it also takes a lot of endurance to be able to sprint for a solid minute, which also helps me. Improvement-wise, I could definitely use some work on my jumps: long, triple and high jump are all events that I feel like I could be a lot better in if I put in the time to practice them, I just never seem to get around to it. In four years of track, there really haven’t been many events that I still haven’t tried with pole vault, javelin and the two-mile being the only exceptions. I'm sure that if I did any of those events I’d be equally terrible at all of them.
10. Track & Field is a unique sport, in the individual events there is no one else to rely on but yourself, while in the relays you need to have 3 other strong legs to succeed. Do you prefer the individual events or the relays? What is one thing that competing in the sport has taught you?
I like the relays better than the individual events. I wouldn’t say that there’s less pressure in a relay though, because even though you have three other guys to fall back on, there’s that much extra pressure not to be the weak link on the team that blows the lead or falls too far back on their leg. Relays have a great team feel that individual races can’t match because during a relay you want the other three guys on your team to succeed just as much as you want yourself to do well. That’s one really important thing that track has taught me – you can never just focus on yourself in a meet because it takes more than just one person to win (in most cases at least). Track is a team sport more than anything else and I’ve seen more than once how even a single point can make the difference between a team’s victory or defeat.