Coming off of a red-shirt sophomore season, distance runner Brent Des Roches might have expected to be rusty heading into competition for the first time in over a year. Not the case.
The junior posted an 8:21.6 time in the men's 3000-meter event, which was held indoors at Wisconsin-Milwaukee Saturday afternoon. The runner with the next best time was 59 seconds slower and watched Des Roches lap him nearly three times.
"I felt good out there, but I look to improve upon that time still," Des Roches said.
The junior sat out last season to participate in a work co-op program for engineers. In his freshman season, he placed second behind a teammate in the 3K event, and was tops on the Marquette track squad in the 5K. By posting a time of better than 8:36 in the 3K (8:21.6), he qualified for Big East competition Saturday.
"What I did in Conference-USA isn't really relevant to how I perform in the Big East this year, because the competition is that much better," he said. "In C-USA, there were a lot of times I went in expecting to win, whereas this year, I'm going to be working harder to get a victory. It's going to be a lot more challenging, but also a lot more fun."
Des Roches holds the second best time in school history in the 3K, only two tenths of a second behind the record-holder. The time to beat is 7:56. And you can bet he's got that number in his head.
"Probably not this year but next year, you know, I've already dropped a few seconds and I know I can drop a few more," he said.
He'll be focusing on gaining as many team points as possible, in the near future though. Two times locked in the back of his head are 8:06 and 7:56. The first would grant him a provisional qualification for Nationals. The second gains him an automatic bid. Sixteen runners make Nationals each year.
"He did great," said assistant coach Bert Rogers. "He's one of our leaders, and definitely one of our strongest runners."
For now, the 2003 C-USA freshman of the year will look forward to the fall season finale. Marquette heads to the Redbird Open in Normal, Ill., this Saturday.