Suffern (N.Y.) junior becomes national champ
By Christopher Hunt
GREENSBORO, N.C. – She remembered what happened last time and how deflated she felt. She remembered how it made her skin crawl every time she thought it.
And it wouldn’t happen again. It couldn’t happen again. No matter what.
Even when Suffern’s Shelby Greany plunked two feet in the water jump in the 2,000 steeplechase, she didn’t lose a step. Greany refused to endure that nightmare again. She refused to go down that way – again.
She bolted out the water jump, attacked the last steeple and sprinted to her dream. Greany won the 2,000 steeplechase in 6:42.86, her best time and the third-fastest time in meet history.
“I knew that if it came down to a sprint I’d be ready for it,” she said, remembering how she flubbed the last water jump then butchered the last hurdle last year and finished second by .08 of second to Hannah Davidson of Saratoga Springs. Coburn crossed second in 6:44.42. Davidson placed third in 6:54.69 and Emma Miller-Bedell of Tappan Zee was fourth in 6:55.74.
“I just thought about how bad it sucked last year. The last barrier was where I lost it.”
The junior took pace from the start and cruised the first mile around 5:23 when Emma Coburn of Crested Butte, Colo. crept to her shoulder. Coburn took the lead with 700 left but Greany recovered but Coburn seemed to be setting the table to steal the race in a dash home.
“My coach (Lou Hall) said to just forget about time,” she said. “We came here to win.”
Greany had barely stepped off the track before she started dissecting the race. She said it was terrible. Her hurdling was off and her water jumps stunk. She could have run under-6:40.
“Hey, you won,” Hall told her. “That’s all that matters.”
Greany comes from steeplechasing royalty. Former teammate Kara McKenna, now at N.C. State, finished third and second at NON in 2004 and 2005 respectively and is the third-fastest steeplechaser in U.S. history.
“I guess we finally got one,” Greany said.
Reach Christopher Hunt at chunt@armorytrack.com.