Waccamaw’s Marsh rallies, thrives on biggest cross country stage

In a year he had hoped to fill the void left by former captain and state runner-up Robert Jones, Waccamaw’s Blake Marsh had his season turned upside down before it even began.

In mid-August, during summer conditioning, Marsh found that what he had thought was a sprained wrist suffered during soccer practice in 2012 was actually a break. Due to improper healing it would require corrective surgery and keep his running shoes in the closet for an extended period.

“I wasn’t able to do pushups so I thought it was a sprain and that it was going to slowy heal itself,” said Marsh, this year’s Sun News Toast of the Coast Runner of the Year selection, who would then miss all of summer conditioning and the beginning of his final season. “I just had to catch up.”

Marsh made his initial return to running in a mid-season race, and coach Robert Del Bagno recalled being impressed with the senior’s ability to run fast times right out of the gate. He also noted Marsh’s ability to be a leader, albeit with a different, more quiet style than what he had seen with Jones, last year’s Toast of the Coast Runner of the Year.

“Besides his running, he’s just an outstanding individual,” Del Bagno said. “He came through a lot of adversity this year.”

But despite what he had impressed upon his coach, Marsh said he still wasn’t satisfied. He had set goals for himself to lead the team both as a captain and at the end of each race, and he wasn’t happy settling for mid-pack finishes. The surgery also forced him to wear a soft cast on his wrist, which gave him shoulder cramps at the start of the season. In the end he didn’t feel up to 100 percent until a few weeks before the state championship in Columbia.

“It was tough because I was supposed to be No. 1 for Waccamaw and coming back and finishing fifth or sixth on my team with a time that I ran a year ago wasn’t too encouraging. I was a little let down,” Marsh said. “I don’t really know, I was just always used to being in the front, so when I was finishing in the back … it was more mental than physical.”

Marsh’s run to states included a runner-up finish to Aynor’s Joey O’Neill at the Region VII-AA championships, and then a run to 4th place with a time of 17:23 at the Lower State Championships – a race Delbagno said he told his runners to pace themselves in.

That left Marsh with one chance left to break the 17-minute barrier he’d been eyeing all season, and he didn’t let himself or his team down when they made the trek to Columbia. The senior not only ran a personal best time of 16:52, but he also bested his regional rival O’Neill, and with the help of his teammates led Waccamaw to a second consecutive Class AA runner-up finish. Teammate Grant Smith finished 14th with a time of 17:14.

“[Marsh] crossed that line and he was just so happy, you could see it on his face,” Del Bagno said. “It’s really special when you see a kid set a goal and accomplish it throughout the year”

Marsh is looking forward to March when he can finally lose the cast just in time for his final soccer season. Marsh isn’t sure if he wants to pursue running at the collegiate level. He said he’s looking to stay in state, and whether he continues running will depend on where he goes. Currently the senior is looking at Winthrop and The Citadel. He hopes to study pre-health, but he won’t undersell how satisfied his final season has left him.

“It was pretty awesome,” Marsh said. “We were shooting for first place, but I was just happy to finish off the with a trophy and a PR.”

This story was originally published December 24, 2014 at 7:41 PM with the headline "Waccamaw’s Marsh rallies, thrives on biggest cross country stage."