Penn State-bound Luke Seymour is enjoying the chase

Track & Field coverage presented by ATT Sports, Inc.

By Jason Guarente — MikeDragoSports.com senior correspondent

Before he could start chasing records and add to his gold medal collection, Luke Seymour had to spend some hours in the pool. They were grueling. They were tedious. They were his only way back.

The injury snuck up on him. A week after Schuylkill Valley’s senior placed fourth in the District 3 Class 2A cross country championships, he had to pull out of the PIAA race after about 600 meters.

Seymour told coach Allyson McKechnie he was feeling pain on the Tuesday after the district meet. The first guess was tendinitis or shin splints. Nothing that should stop Seymour from giving it his best shot in the final fall race.

Then it became much worse. It became a stress fracture.

“It was a scare,” McKechnie said. “It was the weirdest injury. It broke at the state meet. He felt it go and he pulled himself right out. It was like, ‘Where did that come from?’ It didn’t go in its proper timeline.”

Seymour didn’t know how long it was going to take to recover. The initial guess was 3-4 weeks. That turned into three months. He lost his entire basketball season and his final track season was in jeopardy. He spent a good part of January and February doing aquatic workouts at Body Zone.

It was two days of deep water running, one day on a bike and three days of light jogging. Every week. The pool exercises got more intense once the calendar flipped to February.

“It definitely wasn’t too much fun,” Seymour said.

Seymour’s results, somehow, remain as impressive as ever. His senior season is unfolding just as he imagined.

The Penn State recruit’s 1:55.39 in the 800 ranks first in PIAA Class 2A by nearly three seconds. His 4:21.03 in the 1600 ranks third. Those are his top two events. He attempted the 400 at the Schuylkill Valley Invitational Saturday and hit the line at 50.19. Only four Class 2A runners have been better.

“I do have some big goals I’m trying to hit,” Seymour said. “Records are always in the back of my mind.”

The SV invitational provided a glimpse into Seymour’s competitive mindset. After he finished the 400, he quickly met with McKechnie to see if he broke the school record. He was annoyed when he fell a little short. That’s how he thinks. The 400 is just a tuneup, a way to get faster in the 800 and he still tried to make history.

Roughly an hour later, Seymour broke Clay Stabolepszy’s school record in the 800. A mark he pursued since he was a freshman.

“The cool thing about him is he’s not that kind of runner that goes over the top with anxiety,” McKechnie said. “He knows he has a job to do and he can prepare for it. He gets upset when he doesn’t achieve what he wants. Some people, it would rattle them. He’s worked on that.”

McKechnie is the distance guru among SV’s coaches. Seymour is the greatest runner the school has ever known. It’s hard to argue otherwise. Between now and Memorial Day weekend, he’ll determine just how high he sets the bar.

Every day there are two training plans for the runners at Schuylkill Valley. One for Seymour and one for everyone else. 

“You know what’s great? I’ll tell him this is what you’re running, these are the splits I want and this is how much rest you get,” McKechnie said. “He won’t take an extra 30 seconds of recovery. He does it.”

Seymour wants to reach the low 1:50s in the 800 and possibly take a run at Dylan Eddinger’s county record of 1:51.19, set seven years ago. The PIAA schedule has the 800 and 1600 on separate days, allowing Seymour to run both at full strength.

State gold is the other goal. One that barely eluded Seymour when he finished behind Carson McKoy of Deer Lakes by a half-second last May. He was clipped at the end.

“That still makes me so mad to look back on it,” Seymour said. “It was me going down the home stretch and I really thought I had it. With 10-20 feet to go, I see a guy out of the corner of my eye.”

There’s a rule McKechnie has put in place to help cope with disappointing days. Seymour is allowed to dwell on his results for two minutes. That’s it. Then, good or bad, he must move forward.

Getting silver by a half-second tested those limits. Seymour used the fuel from that frustration and ran a 1:52.75 at the John Hay Distance Festival the following weekend. He has those lower numbers in him. No one besides Boyertown’s Eddinger has broken 1:54 during the PIAA schedule.

Setting firsts is what drives Seymour as he nears the end of his high school days. He races against the clock as much as his rivals.

“It definitely makes the sport of running more enjoyable,” Seymour said. “I’m always chasing some record or some time.”

Seymour already owns a few of those records. He hopes there are more waiting for him.