UC IRVINE NOTEBOOK / JOHN WEYLER : Monson Whets Her Appetite for Success

Maybe it’s the wheat. More likely it’s hard work and sound coaching.

Laura Monson is allergic to so many foods--wheat, oats, yeast, chicken, dairy products, eggs, squash and nuts, to name a few--that sneaking a Wheat Thin without suffering an adverse reaction is reason to rejoice.

These days, Monson has plenty of reasons to celebrate: small steps in the kitchen and huge strides on the track, where she has become Irvine’s top distance runner as a freshman.

She finished eighth in the Big West Conference during cross-country season and has trimmed 36 seconds off her best time in the 3,000 meters (9 minutes 53.7 seconds); almost 30 seconds off her personal best in the 5,000 (17:28.29), and lowered her best time in the 1,500 by 11 seconds (4:41.10).

In Irvine’s first five track meets this year, she won the 3,000 all three times she ran it, the 5,000 the one time she entered and finished second and fourth in the 1,500.

“The conference rankings aren’t out, but you can safely say she’s in the top three in each of those events,” Coach Vince O’Boyle said.

Monson drew some notice as a sophomore at Claremont High, but didn’t progress much after that. She chose Irvine over Washington and Idaho and O’Boyle has benefited from all that pent-up potential.

“She had a different coach after her sophomore year and he was basically a sprint coach,” O’Boyle said, “She didn’t have the strength or knowledge to improve as a junior and senior. She had no idea about pace. She would just go right to the front every time. And she wasn’t a very good finisher.

“But she’s already learned a lot because she’s dying to learn. She’s developed a good sense of pace and she’s closing races well now. And she’s just scraping the surface.”

Monson says O’Boyle has helped her with technique and race savvy, but his training program has allowed her to reach a new level of fitness.

“In high school, we had a very low-mileage program and we trained with the 800 runners,” she said. “I’d run a two-mile and when the mile hit, there was nothing.

“Vince’s program is considered low-mileage on this level, but I’m running way more than I ever did in high school.”

And ever so willingly, O’Boyle will tell you with wonder.

“I’ll give them a workout to do on their own and Laura will say, ‘So we run for an hour on Saturday and 30 minutes on Sunday, right?’ and I’ll know that those two things will be done,” he said. “With everybody else, you just hope they do it.

“She’s got that naivete, but she’s very, very tough. She won’t quit on anything. Over Christmas vacation, she followed her program exactly. And when an athlete comes to you in really great shape, it’s our job as teachers to make sure she’s prepared for the big steps.”

In this case, a leap. And all it took was dedication, good advice . . . and soon maybe a spoonful of the Breakfast of Champions.

(Hold the milk, though.)

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Ouch patrol: The men’s tennis team, picked No. 25 in the nation in the preseason Intercollegiate Tennis Assn. poll, has slipped to 7-8, losing close matches to USC, UCLA, Cal and Princeton.

Irvine’s No. 2 singles player, Fred Bach, has been hampered by a hamstring injury and No. 4 Carlos Bustos has tendinitis in his knee.

“The injuries really hurt when you play as tough a schedule as we play,” Coach Steve Clark said. “We have some depth, but it’s mostly young talent.”