Me, Thomas, and Papa Heaps did a shake out run half way into our drive up. We did a mile and stretched out. When we got to Holt Arena, me and the twins did a mile around the track to get familiar with it. Then when it was time to warm up we did a mile warm up. I stretched out and my IT band felt fine. I did my strides right before we were gonna start and my spikes were slipping around everywhere. I had heard that it can be slippery but I didn't think much of it. Because of this I could accelerate very fast, so when the gun went off I was in last place.
I was in the second fastest heat. I was ranked 11th out of the 18 people in the heat, but the faster times were 18 so I had the 8th fastest time in the heat. So I started out in last right behind Zac Jacklin. I knew that he was just getting warmed up and that he would move up, so for the first few laps I stayed behind him and we moved up together (before he started racing and beat me by 50 meters) I was at 4:50 first mile, so in the few laps after that my legs were tired, but they didn't hurt so that was good. The top 14 times in prelims qualify for finals on Saturday, so I kept telling myself, get top 5 in my heat and hope that the other heats dont have fast times. Well a little after the mile I was in a few people back of that, so I picked out a Davis kid who was a few seconds ahead of me and tried to catch him. I passed him and some other guys and tried to hold on as long as I could. You never know how many people in the other heats are gonna beat you, so I pushed the last 100 really hard and passed 2 guys right before the finish. It kinda suprised me because they weren't pushing it very much, all I know is I didn't want to be the guy that missed finals by 1 second, so I made sure I passed them. I finished 5th in my heat, which was exactly my goal! Zac got 9:39 and Alek Parsons also in my heat got 9:44. I got 9:48 which is a three second pr! And I qualified for finals on Saturday, so after the race I was freaking out I was so happy. I finished with the 9th fastest time in prelims, so I made it by 5 spots.
I will continue to ice and roll out and stuff so I feel good for finals and can hopefully set another pr. My goals for Saturday are 9:45 and dont get lapped by Elijah and Levi.
Shout out to my best homie Thomas Matthew Alma Heaps! He got a 4:33 in his mile and he also qualified for finals on Saturday!
| 