Cosby’s Riley Brady grimaces in pain after enduring a leg cramp to finish Saturday’s Milestat Cross Country Invitational in 17:36. I photo by Anjie Henley
On the tracks and racing trails, Riley Brady is powered by the usual flesh, bone and determination, plus something else – a pair of stainless-steel screws.
Brady is Cosby High’s “man of steel” … or to be more specific, stainless steel.
The screws were surgically inserted last fall to patch up a fractured right hip he suffered in a running accident.
So bye-bye competitive running and hello remote control device, bag of potato chips and a seat on the recliner?
Not in this special case.
Rather than a dead end, the ordeal turned out to be little more than a speed bump for the 5-8, 145-pound senior whippet who oozes confidence and grit.
A few months after Brady broke his hip, he broke the Titans’ school record in the 800 – legging a 1:59.6 at last spring’s Dominion District meet.
Now he’s laying tracks, over hill and dale, for a Cosby cross-country program trying to rebound from the 2011 graduation loss of Dominion kingpin Evan Niciphor.
“I’m just happy to be out here – a year later, pain free … it’s magnificent,” Brady said following his less-than-best effort in the Milestat.com Festival Oct. 15 at Pocahontas State Park.
Brady caught a leg cramp early in the 5-K race (against premier runners from 25 teams) and finished in a pedestrian (for him) 17:36.
Earlier this fall he covered the same distance in 16:52 at the Great American in Cary, N.C.
His resume also includes a 16:45 for 3.0 miles at Fork Union; plus he won a Dominion tri-meet victory in 17:09.
With a twinkle in his dark eyes, Brady says the only time he feels the screws is “when it rains.”
Rising barometric pressure, he admits, offers an advance weather watch.
So has the “trick hip” made him an amateur climatologist?
“I don’t want to claim any supernatural power,” he said, “but people at school do ask me if I think it’s going to rain.”
Brady was an undersized wide receiver with four percent body fat on the Titans football team until trading in his shoulder pads for racing spikes.
His love for wildlife parallels his passion for racing.
Brady has worked at the Metro Zoo in western Chesterfield and plans to major in Marine Science at the University of South Carolina.
This is just his first full season of cross country. With only one shot, he vows not to “screw it up.”
The Milestat girls’ race may have offered a sneak peek of the state Group AAA meet, as Cosby senior Megan Moye was second behind Lake Braddock ideally named junior, Sophie Chase.
Moye ran 17:40, bettering her meet-record time of 17:42 set a year ago, but fell to Chase’s hot-footed, personal record of 17:22.
“It wasn’t my best race – my quads were a little tight,” said Moye. “I kept pushing, hoping I could catch her on the hills … but every time I looked up, I was a little further behind.”
A year ago, Moye was third at States behind runner-up Chase and champion Hannah Lowery of Stafford.
Long-time competitors Moye and Chase are Facebook friends and close buds off the trails.
“Sophie is so nice; it’s like she’s the sweetest person,” said Moye, defending Dominion District and Central Region champ.
Says Chase: “Megan pushes me; I push her. We work off each other.”
Moye’s teammate, Kate Birnbaum, was the next highest local finisher in the girls A race. She placed 30th with a time of 19:37.
Cosby’s Lindsey Blum was 42nd in 19:51 and teammate Amy Pokrifka was 63rd in 20:07.
Titans Alaina Redd (71st) and Alex McAllister (76th) also cracked the top 100 in the girls varsity A race, which had 181 competitors.
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