By Christopher Tremblay

It wasn’t a sport that he envisioned himself taking part in when he was a youngster growing up in Norwood. Playing Little League, he found himself on the mound as a pitcher, and in high school, he played outfield for the junior varsity squad. But running would eventually take over and he would pursue the sport all three seasons for the Mustangs. 

 

“In middle school, they had a cross country program, so along with a bunch of friends we all tried it out,” Dylan O’Brien said. “It was a good experience for me and I enjoyed it so I ran cross country in sixth and seventh grade. I really liked the team, and we had a lot of fun. Unfortunately, most of my friends quit after that first year, but I stuck with it. I enjoyed it so much that I decided to give up baseball to focus on track as I felt that I was better at it.”

Upon entering Norwood High School, O’Brien joined the cross country team where he posted a personal best of 18:33. This year as a senior he has cut his time down to 16:21.

During the winter season, the Norwood native runs the 1000 and 4x400; his personal best at the middle distance has been 2:43. The movement from cross country to indoor track had him elated with the sport.

“I found that I liked track a lot better because there were no hills to run and I felt that I had more speed than stamina, although I had the stamina from cross country,” O’Brien said. 

However, while O’Brien seemed to enjoy running the middle distance events he had himself a very tough time in the beginning transitioning into the winter track season from cross country. The now senior recalls his first track race was tough as he really didn’t understand how to approach his event.

“I came into my first track race treating it like it was a cross country race where I was pacing myself which I really didn’t need to do as this was a much shorter race,” O’Brien said. “After a few races, I realized that I didn’t need to pace myself and that I still had a lot left in the tank when the race was done.”

Having not run track before he didn’t really know where his first race time (3:01 in the 1000) fit in so he began comparing his running times to that of senior Paul Forest to get a sense of the event. 

Upon entering his first indoor track season, he figured that Coach Matt Curran would slot him in the two-mile race because he was a cross country runner, but that didn’t happen as Norwood had a couple of good 2-milers on the team. Curran thought that the 1000 would be best for O’Brien.

After his first season running for Norwood, O’Brien would continue to practice every day, while using speed workouts to help decrease his times. Each and every meet O’Brien saw his times drop slightly, but it was usually during the big meets like the Tri-Valley League Championship and Divisional Meets where he saw the biggest decrease. The Mustang senior noted the decrease were larger during those meets as he was competing against some better competition.

Through his three years thus far as a Norwood runner, the senior has been named to the TVL All-Star team for cross country and winter track during both his sophomore and junior seasons, while also being named to the spring All-Star team last year as a junior.

When his senior seasons began in the fall, O’Brien was looking to go out and have fun while continuing to decrease his times. Finishing his junior season running cross country O’Brien ran a personal best of 17:22, and coming into this season he wanted to get his time below 16:45, which he did.  His other goals this year will be to get his 1000 time below 2:38 (he’s currently 5 seconds above that as the season gets under way) and in the spring he would like to see his 800 time go below 1:58 (he is 4 seconds above that right now).

To accomplish his goals, the Norwood runner will have to consistently train.

Once high school is complete, O’Brien’s cross country and track career will come to an end as he has no plans on taking part in any kind of running sports in college.

“I’ll still continue to run to stay in shape,” O’Brien said. “To compete in college will be a lot of work and I’m going to want to focus more on my education.”

Although college is still another ten months away, O’Brien will still have two track seasons remaining with Norwood where he is looking to do some special things in his events.