Keith Pompey: He's miles ahead of pack

Every so often, Southeastern Pennsylvania is blessed with a boys' track phenom.

In the mid 1980s, Penn Wood had Leroy Burrell and Mark Fowler. Archbishop Kennedy's Paul Vandergrift and Central's William Reed came along several seasons later. In the mid '90s, Overbrook's Deworski Odom was the man.

Now, add Central Bucks South's Tom Mallon.

"Man, look! He's the truth," Engineering and Science coach Ray Womack said. "From what I can see, the boy is the real deal."

That's because the junior is one of the nation's premier half-milers.

In February, the 17-year-old Mallon won the 800 meters at the Pennsylvania Track and Field Coaches Association indoor state championship in 1 minute, 51.79 seconds. It was the nation's all-time second-fastest indoor time by a junior. The fastest is a 1:50.55 by Michael Granville of Bell Gardens (Calif.)

Mallon followed that Saturday with a 1:49.79 relay split during the Titans' third-place finish in the Penn Relays' 4x800 Championship of America race.

The frightening thing for opponents is that the defending Class AAA outdoor 800 champion hasn't even scratched the surface in regard to his potential.

Fearing burnout, Mallon competes in a limited number of races. He has never participated in summer track. Instead, he shuts everything down once the Titans' season is complete.

"For me, I would rather see him do well in college than do well is high school," Titans coach Mike Cox said. "So I really make sure that we are not putting too much heavy mileage on him right now. . . . We are just making sure that he is transitioning from year to year, lowering his times."

In other words, Cox isn't trying to push the all-American's limits.

"I think pretty much the sky is the limit for him," teammate Matt Poiesz said. "He can pretty much do what he wants."

For now, Mallon's focus is on breaking the PIAA outdoor state meet record of 1:50.31 set by Fowler in 1984.

"I want to break 1:50 in the open," he said. "If I do that, I will be happy."

He would also enjoy running under 1:49 on the Titans' 4x800 relay.

"Then, before I get out of high school, I definitely would like to run 1:47" in the open, Mallon said. "Maybe break 1:47."

If so, he'll shatter Vandergrift's state record time of 1:48.8, set in '87. Mallon would also challenge the national record (1:46.45) set by Granville in '96.

Those would be huge accomplishments for someone who once despised track. "I mean, who wants to run in circles?" Mallon said of his early opinion.

But looking to stay in shape for football, he opted to run outdoor track in the seventh grade at Unami Middle School in Chalfont.

Mallon covered the 800 in 2:40 the first time he ran it. The standout shaved 20 second off his time by season's end.

Despite the progress, Mallon still didn't like running.

"It was just a hassle to come out every day and run," he said. "I just got bored with it."

But Mallon continued to show up and lowered his times to 2:08 and 2:04 over the next two seasons at the middle school.

At 6-foot and 145 pounds, he came to the realization last year that becoming the Titans' quarterback on the football team wasn't in his future.

That's when Mallon got serious about track. He even dropped football to run cross-country in the fall.

"I just knew that I wasn't going to college to play football," he said.

Now, he's being recruited by just about every major Division I track and field program.

Stanford University and Virginia are currently the front-runners for Mallon, who carries a 3.75 grade-point average while taking advanced-placement courses.

"I'm thankful that I came out for track," he said.