Haley stuck with cross country and it paid off, leading boys team to state meet; plus 6 more named to all-area team
LIVE OAK — It definitely wasn’t love at first race.
In fact, when Logan Haley began running cross country for the club team at Suwannee Middle School two years ago, he wasn’t good, he didn’t like it and he wanted to quit.
“My mom made me do it and she said, ‘You’re going to stay into it,’” Haley recalled.
With quitting not an option, Haley instead dove into running with everything he had, determined to get better.
That work, which has included offseason workouts in his five-acre backyard, has paid off as Haley won the Suwannee County Invitational with five other top-10 finishes during his freshman year at Suwannee High this fall to earn the title of the Lake City Reporter’s Boys Runner of the Year.
“He’s worked really hard,” Suwannee boys cross country coach Brian Bullock said. “He didn’t come into this whole running scene super fast. He really had to work for it.”
That work began after the seventh-grade introduction to cross country. Haley said his 3K personal best that year was around 14:45. He was among the slowest runners on the SMS club team.
He was determined to make sure that didn’t happen again.
“Over the offseason I got a nice haircut, I hit a growth spurt and I trained in my back yard a ton,” he said. “My eighth grade year was a big year for me.”
His transformation heading into his eighth grade year definitely caught Bullock’s attention. Between his success in cross country and track, where he finished in the top 20 at the middle school state meet in both distance events, Bullock was excited to add Haley to the varsity roster this fall.
He expected Haley would be his top runner after seeing what he was doing in offseason 5K races around the area where he was outrunning some of the Bulldogs who had recently graduated.
“He came in with a lot of confidence,” Bullock said. “He came right into the season ready to roll.”
That confidence stems from those offseason workouts at home where the five acres behind his house turned into his personal home course. Three laps equaled a mile. Most days those laps turned into 8-10 miles. Other days, Haley focused more on his tempo, trying to see how many times he could turn in a sub-20 5K.
It was all a matter of trying to catch up with the pack.
“You’re getting in that work where you can run fast with the other guys,” he said.
It resulted in Haley leaving the pack behind.
Armed with all that work and a smart approach to running as a whole, Haley’s confidence paid off with the big freshman campaign. In addition to the win at the home meet, Haley placed fifth at the Clay County Invitational and the Wakulla XC, sixth at the Dueling Summits and the New World Fall Spectacular B race and 10th at the Alligator Lake Invitational in Lake City.
Haley was also ready for the postseason. His season-best 16:58.80 time came at regionals where he placed 15th. That came after a 14th-place finish at the district meet, and he placed 61st at state.
That home race at the Suwannee County Invitational, though, that is where both Bullock and Haley said he was at his best. Postponed due to Hurricane Helene, the race was ran a week before the district meet on a Tuesday evening on Oct. 22 instead of its typical Saturday morning start.
With Community Christian coming from Tallahassee with a strong top 3 — Luke Meli, Jeremy Collier and Landon Reeves — that had already topped Haley multiple times, Bullock and Haley came up with a plan for how to keep the Bulldogs’ freshman in striking distance. It helps that that is his strongest suit: riding a runner who may be a little bit and then finishing strong.
“Logan ran that race so smart,” Bullock said. “He knew when to take that guy and he did. He took him actually sooner than I thought he would and he held on to the lead a lot longer than I thought he would be able to.”
For Haley, though, it was just another case of showing his elite edge, the mental approach required to make up for what he lacks as such a young runner when it comes to physical maturity.
He finished in 17:03.80 to outlast all three Community Christian runners with Meli nine seconds back and Collier and Reeves nearly 30 seconds behind.
“To be able to stay with them, I have to have a good mindset and just have to be able to out finish them at the end,” he said. “It’s a long race, everybody is going to be exhausted, so you just have to find a way to push through that last little bit.”
Haley definitely knows how to push through, as evidenced by his growth from that not so promising start in seventh grade. Pushing through the hard times, in fact, is what he enjoys most about the sport, which relies on someone’s mental strength and determination to find success.
“There’s no limit on how good you can be in cross country and running,” Haley said. “You have to have determination and be very competitive. That makes it very fun.”
ALL-AREA TEAM
Logan Haley
Suwannee, freshman
The LCR’s Boys Runner of the Year ran a season-best 16:58.80 to place a team-best 15th at the Region 1-2A meet after leading the Bulldogs with a 14th-place finish in District 2-2A, and he went on to lead SHS with a 61st-place finish at the Class 2A state meet. He won the Suwannee County Invitational during the regular season and posted five other top-10 finishes (fifth at the Clay County Invitational and Wakulla XC Meet, sixth at Dueling Summits and New World Fall Spectacular B Race, and 10th at the Alligator Lake Invitational).
Brig Scott
Suwannee, senior
Ran a season-best 17:42.90 to place a season-best fifth at the Suwannee County Invitational. Placed 32nd at the District 2-2A meet and then 52nd in Region 1-2A before finishing 135th at the Class 2A state meet.
Brant Johnson
Suwannee, freshman
Ran a season-best 18:22.30 to finish 58th at the Region 1-2A meet after placing 58th in District 2-2A, and went on to finish 152nd at the Class 2A state meet. Posted a season-best 12th-place finish at the Suwannee County Invitational.
Joshua Thompson
Columbia, senior
Ran a season-best 17:13.80 to finish 41st at the Region 1-2A meet after placing 22nd in District 2-3A. Placed a season-best sixth at the Suwannee County Invitational and also finished seventh at the Clay County Invitational.
Nathan Matsubara
Columbia, senior
Ran a season-best 18:06.50 for a season-best seventh-place finish at the Suwannee County Invitational. Placed 24th at the District 2-2A meet.
Brandyn Pope
Columbia, sophomore
Ran a season-best 18:19.81 to finish 74th at the Region 1-3A meet after placing 42nd in District 2-3A. Posted a season-best ninth-place finish at the Suwannee County Invitational.
John Dale Ringenberg
Columbia, senior
Ran a season-best 17:37.95 to finish 53rd at the Region 1-3A meet after placing 26th in District 2-3A. Posted a season-best 11th-place finish at the Suwannee County Invitational.
COACH OF THE YEAR
Brian Bullock, Suwannee
Bullock’s Bulldogs qualified for state as a team for the fourth straight season, finishing 31st at the Class 2A state meet following a pair of seventh-place finishes in District 2-2A and Region 1-2A. They also posted a pair of runner-up finishes at the Wakulla XC Meet and at the Suwannee County Invitational.