Kevin Docherty walks down the hallway at home every day past posters from his mom’s six U.S. Olympic trials women’s marathon races, so he’s aware and proud of her legacy in distance running.
After the Olympics added the women’s marathon in 1984, Bev Docherty became the only woman in the United States to compete in the first six trials.
She’s still running and is also an assistant cross country coach at Cretin-Derham Hall High School, so it was natural that during a family vacation to Kings Canyon National Park in northern California over the summer that she, Kevin and other family members would head out for a run.
Two blocks in, however, Kevin left his mom in the dust.
“Sometimes,” he said this week, “it’s a little tough for her to keep up.”
His mom grinned at that.
“Absolutely true,” she said.
As a senior cross country runner at Cretin-Derham Hall, Kevin has been leaving everybody behind this season.
The fourth and youngest child of Jim and Bev Docherty’s remarkable running clan, he has emerged as the top-ranked high school boys cross country runner in Minnesota and will be among the favorites in the prep division of the big Roy Griak Invitational cross country meet Saturday, Sept. 29, at the University of Minnesota.
Raiders coach Chris Babcock calls Kevin worthy of the Docherty running tradition.
“I don’t think anybody works harder,” Babcock said. “He’s focused and definitely driven for what he wants to achieve. I don’t think he’s going to be satisfied with anything less than a win, come the end of the season.”
The 6-foot-2, 155-pound Docherty, who finished sixth at last year’s 5-kilometer Class 2A cross country state meet in 15 minutes, 48 seconds, already has produced a career-best time of 15:24 this season and has the individual state title squarely in his sights. He even wears a shirt given him by his dad that reads “Unstoppable,” echoing the words of the late Steve Prefontaine.
“I’m trying to get that mind-set that maybe I am,” Kevin said.
Last spring, after Docherty ran a good 3,200-meter race in Cretin-Derham Hall’s sectional track meet but fell just short of qualifying for the state meet, he was devastated, his mom said.
But, she added: “He came back and ran an unbelievable mile two days later, and I knew right then that he’s a battler. He wasn’t going to give up. I’ve never seen him ease up. It isn’t in him.”
Kevin, 17, hasn’t decided where he wants to run next year but is hopeful college might be the next step toward eventually becoming a pro runner. He says cross country is probably his best sport, but he most enjoys the mile or the 1,600 meters in track because “it’s got distance, but it’s also fast.”
After finishing sixth at the state track meet at 1,600 meters last spring, he dived headlong into summer training. He has been running as much as 70 miles a week, he said, and he considers himself much stronger than a year ago.
It also helps that he dropped soccer and basketball after participating in both, along with cross country and track, as a sophomore.
“Kind of wore me down by the end of the season,” he admitted.
Bill Miles, the longtime coach at Wayzata High School, pulled Kevin aside near the end of his sophomore season to tell him about a Wayzata runner who participated in both cross country and soccer before turning full time to cross country as a junior.
“By his senior year he became a state champion,” Kevin said. “So maybe I can follow in his footsteps.”
He’s already following in the footsteps of older sisters Laura and Jennie and older brother Danny, all of whom excelled at Cretin-Derham Hall and went on to run in college. Laura runs for the Gophers and, like Kevin, will be participating in the Griak Invitational on Saturday.
