Scott Janusick Named News Trib Harrier of the Year!!!!!
Erik Hall- NewsTribune
December 01, 2009
Janusick is success
driven
Friday, November 27, 2009
By Erik Hall
Hall junior Scott Janusick runs incessantly once he begins training
for cross country in July.
Janusick would not be a two-time all-state runner if he trained
lightly.
All the running in July and August is entirely delayed
gratification for Janusick.
The 55 miles a week that he runs in the summer are not fun.
Janusick said that what he enjoys about running is the success, and
he knows the success cannot come without those summer runs. “No
matter how hard you work, you can always get better and with work
comes success,” Janusick said. “If you don’t work then you’re not
going to get that.”
Janusick enjoyed more individual success this year than any other
runner in the area. His accomplishments make Janusick the 2009
NewsTribune Boys Cross Country Runner of the Year. His 2009 season
also included winning the North Central Illinois Conference Meet.
He earned all-regional honors by placing third at the Class 1A Rock
Falls Regional. Janusick picked up all-sectional honors by placing
fifth at the Class 1A Aurora Christian Sectional.
The 2009 season concluded with Janusick earning all-state with a
14th-place finish at the IHSA State Meet in Peoria.
None of the accolades would be possible without those miles he
started logging in July. Those miles he dreaded in July and August
were fruitful in October and November. “The motivation to do good
at the end keeps you going in the middle,” Janusick said.
Most of the time, Janusick had no problem finding that motivation
to keep going. An exception this year came at the Amboy
Invitational on Monday, Oct. 12. Janusick started the race, but he
did not start it well.
He found himself struggling to compete.He decided to stop
running.He quit. He dropped out of the race midway through the
3-mile course.
“I shut down mentally at Amboy,” Janusick said. “That was pretty
much the first time all season that I got boxed in and wasn’t going
out with the leaders. I was about 20(th place). I shut down
mentally and couldn’t go anymore.”
Janusick said he was fine and healthy physically. He just did not
feel like finishing the race.
“When I wasn’t in the top five at the beginning, I just kind of got
shook up, and I just dropped out,” Janusick said.
The Amboy Invitational was only five days before the NCIC Meet, and
it was just 12 days before the postseason started. Hall head coach
Tom Keegan was concerned what performance Janusick would produce in
the upcoming meets following the Amboy incident. “There was some
apprehension about how he was going to come back and respond,”
Keegan said.
Janusick needed just 16 minutes, 12 seconds to erase Keegan’s
apprehension.
He easily won the NCIC Meet beating everyone in the Lincoln
Division and the Reagan Division.
“From Monday through when he crossed that finish line at
conference, I was holding my breath after Amboy,” Keegan said. “I
knew it was probably a fluke, but that little bit of doubt that I
had, he erased it. I knew we were back on track after that.”
Janusick said his struggles at the Amboy Invitational changed the
way he approached races starting with conference that continued all
the way through the state meet. “I think that (the Amboy
Invitational) was a real turning point of my season,” Janusick
said. “It helped me at conference to go out faster and for the rest
of the season to go out faster.”
The confidence that seemed lost during the Columbus Day meet in
Amboy was definitely back by the time Janusick ran at the state
meet. Keegan said he could see a distinct difference in Janusick
when the Hall junior walked on stage at Detweiller Park to receive
his all-state medal. “The way he walked up on stage after
Detweiller, he’s got the chest out and shoulders back and head up,”
Keegan said. “You can tell he’s pretty proud of himself.”
Janusick showed all season that he was physically capable of cross
country success.
He showed in late October and early November that he could also
conquer the toughest aspect of running — the mental aspect. “I
think it all starts between the ears,” Keegan said. “I would think
wrestling and cross country are the most mentally disciplined
sports. Let’s face it, in baseball … you get a chance to catch your
breath, and basketball you sub in and you sub out. Cross county and
wrestling are go, go, go, go, go; and you got to play tricks with
your mind. He’s pretty good at that.”
Janusick will not take much time to rest physically, or mentally,
before he starts training for the track season.
There is more success still to be achieved.
