Marzejon-Ross rivalry, expected or not, is special

The most exciting moments in sports are the unexpected ones, upsets in particular.

That's what makes the emergence this spring of Jacobs track star Sarah Ross as a bona fide challenger to Huntley sprinter Coryn Marzejon so compelling.

Both young women are superior athletes, not to mention fine representatives of their respective families, schools and communities, but the spotlight locally has shined more brightly on Marzejon for the past three years for good reason.

A powerful sprinter signed to run at Michigan State, the senior has earned every word written about her.

Marzejon has won five medals at the state meet in Charleston, including a second-place finish last year in the 400, and she has dominated the sprint races at the McHenry County and Fox Valley Conference meets since her freshman year. She is among the favorites to win the 400 state title as a senior.

Ross, on the other hand, is a versatile athlete who has competed mostly out of the glare. Arguably the top female kickboxer in her weight class in North America, she won an unprecedented fifth straight International Kickboxing Federation championship in July of 2006, but she essentially topped out in that sport.

"I don't want to sound conceited but the only way we could get girls in my weight class to fight was if we were to fly them in from overseas," Ross said. "That can be expensive."

After her last fight Ross shifted her focus to track and field, specifically the pole vault. After qualifying for the state meet in Charleston last year, she narrowly missed making the finals "for technical reasons," she said.

Forget senior-itis. During the winter of her senior year, Ross concentrated on her training like never before.

"I started training before the indoor season," she said. "It's just really good to see that paying off and not declining in my senior season. Everyone says senior year is a fun year, but I just really used lessons learned from years before to motivate me. It's my senior year. I want to go out as the best I can be."

The extra training paid dividends in her specialty. In February Ross posted the best indoor pole vault height in Illinois, 11 feet, 6 inches. In March she committed to vault on scholarship at Western Michigan. She went on to set a FVC meet record with a personal-best vault of 12 feet.

The extra training had another effect: Ross' sprint times dropped. Though, she had raced against Marzejon since her freshman season in the 100-meter dash, Ross could never beat the times turned in by the area's reigning sprint-cess.

That changed when the pair lined up to race in the 200 at the McHenry County Meet on April 18.

Ironically, the 200 is an event Ross rarely competed in because it precedes the final event of each meet, the 1,600-meter relay, a race she always ran. But once an injury to a Jacobs teammate made qualifying for the state meet unlikely in that event, it was decided Ross would compete in the 200 instead.

Against Marzejon in the 200 at the McHenry County Meet, Ross crossed the finish line in 25.37 seconds, just ahead of Marzejon's 25.65, denying the Huntley flash a four-year sweep in the 200 at county. Marzejon did, however, complete four-year sweeps that night in the 100 and 400.

But the loss in her favorite race, the 200, was a stunner to everyone on hand, especially Coryn.

Marzejon did her best to put on a brave face, but losing on the local level to an athlete she'd always beaten hurt. She did what many people do when confronted by a sudden traumatic event: she welled up involuntarily.

"I was kind of disappointed because (finishing second) was something I wasn't expecting," Marzejon said. "But I like Sarah Ross. She's an awesome person. I was happy for her. At first it might not have shown.

"I'm kind of disappointed in how I acted that day. I was just shocked and upset. I started crying. It was just kind of embarrassing to act like that instead of being graceful. At first, I knew everyone was going to be like, 'Oh, Coryn lost.' I just don't think people were expecting it because it doesn't happen a lot."

Ross chalked the win up to perseverance.

"I've just always accepted that one day I'd catch her," Ross said. "One day, you know, it would happen. It just took a little work to get here. That happened this year.

"It just felt like an accomplishment, the same thing as riding your bike for the first time after falling down. You get right back up and get back on. After doing it so many times you finally accomplish it. I just felt like it was another notch in the wall."

The friendly rivals rematched on May 1 at the Fox Valley Conference meet. But prior to their first head-to-head competition as the respective anchors of their 400-meter relay teams, the girls joked along with the girls from other FVC schools about the same stuff all high school girls gab about.

"We all had prom on the same weekend, so everyone was just waiting for conference to be over to start getting ready and preparing for the excitement of prom," Ross said with a laugh. "Everybody in the 4x1 was over there like, 'Yeah, I can't wait to dance.' Then the gun went off and everybody got serious."

Ross' teammates got her the baton first and she maintained that slim lead over Marzejon through the finish line.

Then came another surprise: Ross edged Marzejon for the first time ever in the 100-meter dash, 12.89 seconds to 13.08.

Like the champion athlete she is, Marzejon shook off that loss and blew away the field in her specialty, the 400.

She then bounced back to beat Ross in their showdown in the 200 in a time of 25.87, which was .19 seconds faster than her rival.

"That was a fun race to run," Marzejon said.

The beauty of it is that the fun isn't over. Marzejon and Ross will likely line up head to head at two more meets: at Saturday's Class AA Huntley sectional and, if all goes well, at the state meet in Charleston the following weekend.

However, there is a chance there won't be an anticipated rubber match between the two in the 200 on Saturday. Marzejon may skip the event to help Huntley's 1,600-meter relay team qualify for state instead. However, the pair are expected to run head-to-head in the 100 dash and as anchors in the 400 relay.

Marzejon said after the initial adjustment to being challenged locally, she appreciated what Ross' emergence meant to her own training regimen as she prepared for the state series.

"It made me keep in mind that there are going to be people who can edge me out at the last second, so I do need to make sure I'm focusing and prepared.

"And it makes the event bigger. More people want to watch it and it's more exciting for everyone."

Two champion athletes, taking turns beating each other and pushing each other to new heights of achievement?

That's as exciting as sports get, expected or not.