Khosla gets the golden ticket to the Dream Mile

NorthWest Florida Report by Herb Wills

The word came in the form of a golden ticket on Wednesday, 4 June 2014. Sukhi Khosla, a rising senior at Leon High, was invited to the Dream Mile in New York City. He would be one of the field of 14 elite high school runners running not the 1500, not the 1600, but an actual mile in a featured race at the adidas Grand Prix Meet in Icahn Stadium on June 14.


All season long Khosla had been posting national leading times in the 1600, starting with a 4:13.02 at the Bolles Bulldog Classic on March 7.  After that time was bettered, he grabbed the top of the U.S. high school list again with a front-running 4:06.45 at the 3A Region 1 meet in Tallahassee on April 24.  Garrett Corcoran ran faster in California two days later, but Khosla regained the top ranking with a 4:05.96 at Florida's State Finals on May 3.  Ten days before the Dream Mile, it was still the season's fastest high school 1600 in the country.


If you look at Khosla's credentials, though, you'll see that he's also a reigning high school state champion for 3200 meters on the track and 5000 meters in cross country.  He's won races of up to 15 kilometers.  So in spite of his record in the 1600, Khosla is reluctant to identify as a miler.


"I've always liked the mile," says Khosla. "It's my favorite event, but I still don't consider myself a miler."


As American track fans, though, we want to cast our distance runners as milers. Americans have loved their milers, possibly even farther back than before World War I, when John Paul Jones and Norman Taber became the first Americans to hold the world record in the mile.  During the Great Depression, Kansas miler Glenn Cunningham was the toast of the sports pages.  Baby boomers are waiting for the second coming of Jim Ryun.


Before he was a world record holder and Olympic medalist, in 1964 Ryun became the first high school athlete to go sub-4:00 in the mile.  Only a handful of prep runners have cracked four minutes since then.  Still, anytime someone runs a fast mile or 1600 in a high school race--say under 4:10--you'll start hearing murmurs of "four minutes."


Khosla has heard them.  Like I said, we're waiting for the second coming of Jim Ryun.


Sukhi Khosla won't be the first Florida runner in the Dream Mile.  Just last year, Colonial's Andres Arroyo placed eighth in the Dream Mile, running 4:08.41.  Like Khosla, Arroyo was the national leader for the year in the 1600; his season-topping time was 4:04.45. However, Arroyo was a senior in 2013.  Khosla was a junior this year. He could get a second crack at the Dream Mile in 2015.

Sukhi Khosla leads Niceville's Nick Morken en route to 4:06.45 at the 3A Region Meet

All three of Khosla's nation-leading 1600 efforts this year came at the front end of a double. He was racing the 1600 fresh each time, but he also still knew that there was a 3200 to be run afterwards.  Those 3200 times were 9:11.70, 9:10.96, and 9:05.75, by the way. Not as fast as his 8:59.50 best, but not too shabby, either.  At the Dream Mile, though, Khosla will be running the mile. Period.


"It'll be fun to do just a mile," said Khosla. "They set it up well, with pacers, and this will be a completely different type of competition than I've ever been in. I'm just excited to get up there."


Khosla will also get to run his favorite event again a week later on the west coast.  He accepted an invitation to race in the mile at the Brooks PR Invitational on June 21 in Seattle, Washington.  After that four-lapper in Renton Memorial Stadium, though, Khosla's track season is over.


"After Brooks for sure, definitely done," said Khosla. "Definitely no races after that."


Because there's a cross-country season to prepare for.

Northwest Florida Correspondent Herb Wills

Herb Wills' running career goes back to the 1971 boys' age-group mile at the Florida Relays. Since losing that race he has won the 1976 Florida High School class 4A cross-country championship, 1979 AAU USA junior titles in cross-country and the 10,000 meters, and the 1989 TAC USA 30K national championship. As a distance runner at Florida State University from 1978 to 1982, he was NCAA All-American three times in track and once in cross country, and won a silver medal in the marathon at the 1981 World University Games. Graduating Florida State with a degree in mathematics, in the following years Wills ran in the USA Olympic Marathon Trials in 1984, 1988, and 1992, and placed tenth in the Boston Marathon in 1989. After more than a few years of duty as a hurdle setter and lane judge at track meets, Wills discovered that the public address announcer not only got to sit down at meets but was also sheltered from the rain. Since that revelation you can hear him with a microphone in his hand at several track and cross-country events in the Tallahassee area. Writing is another activity you can do while sitting down, and Wills has written about running for Racing South magazine and Tallahassee's local newspaper, the Tallahassee Democrat.

You can read more running related tidbits in his blog at http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/

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