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LeDuc aims to finish his collegiate career with another national championship

Two-time national champion Michael LeDuc of Connecticut College

Two-time national champion Michael LeDuc of Connecticut College

DELAWARE, Ohio – Connecticut College senior Michael LeDuc of Canton will be racing Saturday in the NCAA Division III outdoor track and field national championship at Ohio Wesleyan.

LeDuc, the defending Division III national champion in the 3,000 meter steeplechase, will be running in the steeplechase final on Saturday at 1:20 p.m. LeDuc is the top seeded runner in the field. He won his qualifying heat Thursday in 9:11.64 to punch his ticket into the final.

LeDuc, a botany major and a 2010 graduate of Canton High, has earned All-American honors eight times in cross country, indoor track and outdoor track in his collegiate career with Connecticut College. He has won a pair of national championships in cross country and last spring in the 3,000 steeplechase.

Last weekend, LeDuc was honored as the co-recipient of the Anita L. DeFrantz Award from Connecticut College. It is given annually to the male and female members of the graduating class whose athletic ability, leadership and sportsmanship best exemplify the qualities of DeFrantz, an Olympic medalist.

LeDuc has done well this spring in his final season of collegiate athletics. The only Division III runner in the field, LeDuc won the 3,000 steeplechase at the Penn Relays with a school-record time of 8:47.94. It was the third fastest time NCAA Division III history and LeDuc beat a field that included primarily Division I athletes. He beat Texas A&M’s Issac Spencer by nearly six seconds.

Last weekend, LeDuc earned a spot on the All-Eastern Conference Athletic Conference (ECAC) team. He was part of Connecticut College’s 4×800 relay team that won the ECAC title. LeDuc ran with Ben Bosworth (Dorchester, Mass.), Ian Rathkey (Old Lyme, Conn.) and Niall Williams (Scotia, N.Y.). They posted a season-best time of 7:51.57 at RPI in Troy, N.Y.

LeDuc won a national championship at the NCAA Division III cross country meet in November in Indiana. His time of 25:22 on the 8 kilometer course at Hanover College was nearly a minute faster than he ran on the same course in October.

He won his first national title last spring in the 3,000 steeplechase at the NCAA Division III championship meet in LaCrosse, Wisc. LeDuc hit the final 3-foot high barrier in the race. But he rallied to catch Middlebury’s Jack Davies in the final 70 meters to win the race by 0.08 of a second with a then-school record time of 8:50.58.

At Canton, LeDuc was an All-State athlete in cross country and in track and field.

NCAA Division III All-American honors
Outdoor track (3)
2013: 1st place, national champion, 3,000 steeplechase
2012: 4th place, 3,000 steeplechase
2011: 6th place, 3,000 steeplechase

Indoor track (3)
2013: 3rd place 5,000 meters
2014: 4th place 3,000 meters
2014: 7th place 5,000 meters

Cross Country (2)
2013: 1st place, national champion
2012: 13th place (top 15 earn All-American honors)

Division III New England championships
2014: 1,500 meters, outdoor track
2013: 5000 meters, outdoor track
2012: 5000 meters, outdoor track

 

Gerry deSimas, Jr., is the editor and founder of The Collinsville Press. He is an award-winning writer and has been covering sports in Connecticut and New England for more than 40 years. He was inducted into the New England High School Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2018.

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