Tamrat Snyder vs. Seydi Sall In Moco 500 Was A Thriller


In a battleground event between two of Montgomery County's brightest stars, it did not disappoint.

Tamrat Snyder of Damacus, one of the state's top 800 meter runners and milers, came down in distance to face off against one of the nation's and Maryland's fastest at 500 meters in Seydi Sall of Richard Montgomery.

It was in last year's Montgomery County Indoor Championships in which Sall ran the nation's fastest 500 meter time in the country with a breakout performance of 1:04.47. Sall was coming off an impressive relay performance at the VA Showcase stepping up in distance to open with a 1:55 split for Richard Montgomery's US #1 7:49 victory down as well as clocking a US #4 1:04.01 PR in the 500 in Lynchburg, Virginia.


Snyder halted some of that momentum on Wednesday with a late move and pass on Sall who led virtually throughout their race in the seeded section of the boys 500 at their county championship meet. Snyder finished with a personal best time of 1:05.41, which ranks #3 in the state of Maryland, as he nipped the current state leader Sall, who was off his 1:04.01 season best from the VA Showcase as the runner-up at 1:04.45. Certainly has to be considered an upset with the 500 being more of Sall's primary event compared to the sub 4:20 miler in Snyder dropping down in distance. 

Later in the meet, the state leader in the 800 in Snyder (1:55.08 season best), had a more intriguing race against the clock as Sall's teammate at Richard Montgomery in Garrett Suhr was forced to run in the slowest of three sections without a verifiable 800 meter time this season. It was unfortunate we could not get a head to head matchup between the two as Suhr just split 1:55 in the 4x800 this past weekend.

Suhr was only able to muster a 2 minutes flat time trial in his unseeded heat, so it forced Snyder to at least run a somewhat honest pace to win the fast section and post the top time overall. Despite being on tired legs from his 500 battle with Sall, Snyder won win his second county title of the evening with a run of 1:57.

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