By Justin Feil, Assistant Sports Editor
Taylor Gatt has been a varsity runner for the Montgomery High School boys cross country team ever year of his career, and every year his season has ended just shy of the Cougars goals.
The Cougars senior has a better feeling that this year his squad is set up to advance beyond sectionals. A strong showing at the Thompson Park Class Meet — site of their sectional — was encouragement enough.
“We were happy that our juniors were able to win,” Gatt said. “And a lot of us were under 17:30. One of our biggest goals is getting out the section. That’s been our goal every one of the past three years. This year feels different. The experience on Thompson Park, especially for some of our younger guys, was good. Hopefully it will be beneficial at sectionals.”
The Cougars will toe the line for another big race this Saturday. The Shore Coaches Invitational sends runners out on the Holmdel Park course — site of the group championships late in the season — for the first time this season.
“I think we all feel really good,” Gatt said. “We went to Holmdel a lot over the summer and did some long runs in there and did a lot of work on that course so we’re prepared. Our dual meets, we’ve run pretty hard in those and the meets we’ve run hard, a lot of us are happy with our times. I think we’re going to try to prove to everyone that the hard work we’ve done is paying off.”
MHS’s results may be difficult to decipher at first, but that’s only because they have to juggle their commitments on Saturday.
“The one thing about Shore Coaches is it’s an SAT day,” said MHS head coach Tim Bartholomew. “Most of my varsity isn’t going to be able to run in the actual varsity race. I think they can step up and run well. More important than how we do is how we approach the course. Some of the varsity will run in the open race and some will run in the varsity.”
Gatt won’t be taking the SATs so he will be able to gear up solely for the race. He’s coming off a strong effort at Thompson Park in which he ran 17:24, just six seconds off his best time there last year in the sectionals.
“Like everyone on the team, I’ve been working just as hard,” Gatt said. “This summer of training was my hardest summer yet. This is my last shot to make it out of the section. I’m going to do everything I can to help our team do that.”
Gatt and top junior Ajay Sarathy, who had the fourth best time all day at Thompson Park two weeks ago, are the only two runners from last year’s final top seven back. Both have been running like team leaders. Gatt is a team captain along with fellow captain Nick Desai, and Gatt has lived up to his role.
“He’s been good,” Bartholomew said. “The nice thing about our varsity is we have so much depth that anyone can move in and out on any given day. He’s been varsity the entire time. He’s been consistent. And he’s a good leader.
“His consistency is better. In previous years, he could run some excellent races and then he’d be off the mark on other ones. As he’s gotten older, his bad races and good races aren’t as far apart as they used to be.”
Gatt attributes that improvement to his offseason work. He’s been happy to see it pay off.
“Consistency comes with training,” he said. “With the hard summer of training, I think that’s where the consistency will come from. That’s what I learned from summers in the past. I’ve seen it and I’m trying to spread it to our team. When we’re tired, the hard training helps with consistency.”
It goes back to the summer. When it started, Gatt wasn’t quite sure what to expect of the Cougars. They didn’t have a lot of varsity racing experience, but they did show a penchant for working hard that has delivered promising results in-season.
“I’m not surprised now,” Gatt said. “Back in June when we started training for cross country, that’s when I was surprised. I was surprised how hard the guys were working and how badly they wanted it and how big of a jump they were taking. I could tell by the training, it looked like they’d have good seasons ahead of them. Am I surprised now? No, but I was surprised in June with how successful it looked like they would be.
“I think the summer was great,” he added. “We went to Push Your Pace Cross Country Camp at Ramapo College. It’s run by (Rich) Refi from Hillsborough and the Ramapo cross country coach. That really kicked our training into high gear. We were training hard before that, and after that we started training harder and faster than I’ve trained in my career. This summer was lot different than previous last three years.”
Bartholomew has helped to keep the Cougars focused on the task ahead as they have opened the first month of the season.
“We had a lot of strong work ethics in the summer,” Bartholomew said. “They put in a lot of miles in the summer and came to practice and did everything to be better and so far we are.
“The goal has always been the same. Our ultimate goal is to get out of the section. That’s always the goal. Every meet we’re in, we want to be in it to win it. The goal is to get out of the section. We want to place really high in the county and the conference. The goal is the same every year, it’s just how close we can come to achieving them.”
Bartholomew believes this team is setting itself up for a strong finish. MHS may not have a lot of big race experience yet, but they are perched to do something big.
“The best part about our team is the depth,” Bartholomew said. “When one person has an off race, someone else steps up and fills their shoes right away. I don’t have to worry about them having off days, there’s so much depth and competition within the group that everyone is fighting to be in the top five and top seven.”
Added Gatt: “The guys that are juniors now have really stepped up since they won Thompson. They’ve been looking amazing. Nick Desai, he took a big jump. The kids that were freshmen, and are now sophomores, like Austin Fan is doing awesome. The juniors have been stepping up. I think they’ve really handled getting thrown into it really well.”
The class race gave the Cougars an early idea of their potential, and it also added some motivation to continue to train harder.
“It’s definitely one we go to with the intention of doing well,” Bartholomew said. “We want to gain confidence and gain familiarity. I was extremely happy with how they ran there. They obviously have to run better. The average was 17:16 and you have to run 16:45 to get out. You probably have to be below 16:50. Everyone has to get better, but it was definitely a good starting point.”
It’s the finish that Montgomery is keeping its eye on. The Cougars want to extend their season beyond sectionals. Taylor Gatt is hopeful that he can help lead MHS the farthest they’ve been in states in his career.
“I am one of the most experienced guys on the team,” he said. “I’ve been on varsity since my freshman year. I had such great leaders when I was an underclassman. I try to do the same thing and make up for some of our team’s lack of experience and be a strong leader.”
