Anchorage Daily News

Trevor Dunbar crossed the finish line for the final time as a high school runner Sunday, putting a swift and mostly satisfying end to a brilliant senior year.

Dunbar, who spent his final year in Kodiak establishing a national reputation, captured third place in the junior men's 5,000-meter race at the U.S. Track & Field Championships in Eugene, Ore.

One of only a handful of high school runners in a 25-man race dominated by college freshmen, Dunbar finished in 14 minutes, 43.98 seconds. Big gaps separated the top finishers: Dunbar trailed winner Colby Lowe of Oklahoma State by 12 seconds and runner-up Sean Keveren of Virginia by about six, and he was 14 seconds ahead of the fourth-place finisher.

The race, coming in front of a crowd of about a thousand at Eugene's revered Hayward Field, marked Dunbar's final race until he begins his college career this fall with the University of Portland cross-country team.

"He had a great whole year for his senior year," said Marcus Dunbar, Trevor's dad and his coach at Kodiak High School. "This was a nice little icing on the cake."

The bronze-medal performance capped a year -- perhaps the best by any high school runner in Alaska history -- that produced one headline after another:

• First place 10 days ago in the Nike Outdoor Nationals two-mile race in Greensboro, N.C., with a time of 8:49.79, the fastest ever by an Alaska high schooler;

• Third place two weeks ago at the Twilight Mile in the Portland Track Fest, where 10 of the nation's top milers gathered for a showdown;

• Second place in the Foot Locker national cross-country championships last fall in San Diego;

• First place in the 5-K Adidas Cross-Country Classic with a time of 14:47.7 that ranked as the fastest prep performance in the country for part of the season;

• First place in the three-mile race at the Mt. Sac Cross-Country Invitational last fall in Walnut, Calif.;

• Repeat championships in the 1,600 and 3,200 at the Alaska state track and field championships;

• A third straight championship, in a course-record time, at the Alaska state cross-country championships.

About the only thing that eluded Dunbar was the state record in the 3,200, which he had been eclipsing in meets all season. But records can only be set at the state meet, and when action started in Fairbanks, he was sick with strep throat.

He nonetheless won both distance races at the championships, but he didn't etch his name into the record book. In no time, however, he was back at seemingly full strength, stringing together three fine races at Outside meets this month.

"He had a nice recovery after (being sick)," Marcus Dunbar said. "It was kind of a letdown when he wasn't 100 percent for state because he really wanted to run fast there."

Dunbar made up for it by claiming a national title at the Nike Outdoor Nationals, winning the two-mile by beating many of the top prep runners in the country. That was his final race against an all-prep field, his last race before going to Eugene for the U.S. championships.

Sunday marked just the fourth time Dunbar has run 5,000 meters on a track. After a slow first kilometer, Dunbar followed when an Air Force Academy runner made a move.

After that, he was always among the top three or four runners, his dad said.

"He was pretty competitive out there," Marcus Dunbar said. "The guys he was running with had faster (qualifying) times than him -- eight had better times than him coming in."

Dunbar was almost 10 seconds off his personal-best of 14:34 in what his dad -- a former national champion in the indoor mile -- called a slow race.

"He won't be real pleased with the time or the place, but the way he competed was good," Marcus Dunbar said. "It was a solid run for him at a new level."

Fourth place for Clarke

Jordan Clarke of Anchorage, a freshman at Arizona State, took fourth place in Friday's junior men's discus, a day after winning the junior men's shot put.

On Sunday, Clarke placed 21st in the senior men's shot put, where he tossed the 16-pound shot 58 feet, 4 3/4 inches. Christian Cantwell's winning effort traveled 71-7 1/4.

In the discus, Clarke uncorked a throw of 191-3 on his sixth and final attempt. He was three inches out of third place and 13 feet out of first place.

Find Beth Bragg online at adn.com/contact/bbragg or call 257-4309.

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