Yesterday's track meet experience began with discrimination against track athletes. Meaning we rode a school bus for two hours. I was out of comfortable positions after fifty minutes. And we were on the school bus for two whole hours. Why don't I play any sports that receive attention?
During this two hour bus ride (and this was only on the way there) we had to stop in some town in the middle of nowhere because one of the sprinters (this wouldn't have happened with any of the distance runners) had to go to the bathroom. Yes she is pretty fast sprinter but we were about half an hour away and she was only one girl. This made me very angry because I wanted to get off the bus as soon as I could.
When we actually arrived at the meet, it was windy and in the upper 50's. It was a coed varsity meet with teams we don't usually compete against. We were only there about five minutes before I began warming up with my teammate AK for the 3000m. I wasn't feeling good about my races but I had managed to change my attitude about the 3000. Because the teams were smaller, I thought I might have a chance to place. My legs were very tired though and I was having to do the big double, the 3000 and the 1500. For some reason my coach put me in these events, probably because I didn't tell him I was so tired. I was running well earlier in the week but our Wednesday practice really tired me out. I wasn't feeling ready at all and wasn't sure how I would do.
We spent about 10 minutes in line for the bathroom although it would've been longer if a couple of girls hadn't taken over the men's restroom for awhile. After our wonderful wait, we did some stretching. I paid close attention to my right calf and shin which have been feeling a little weird. The adrenaline must've been working though because they didn't hurt during my race. We did some strides which I usually try to avoid and then we were ready to go.
My goal for the race was 92 seconds per lap or 11:30. My coach thought I could do it as long as we didn't start out too fast. I thought I could improve this week and was ready to race as we stood on the line. My teammate and I ran the first lap around 86 seconds, a little fast but we were in the back. My coach just reassured us and sure enough, we were moving up. AK and I were using our tactic of running together except she was behind me, something I still haven't gotten used to. I thought we were going a little too slow but my coach wasn't saying much about it.
The 3000m seems like a very long race and it is, but it goes by quicker than you would think when you are running it. That's what it seemed like with two laps to go, when I was around 8:51, almost 10 seconds slower than I have been at the same point. This really disappointed me. I wasn't going to get 11:30 and I knew I probably wouldn't improve. My legs might've been moving just as fast, but my attitude changed when those numbers were called out. My motivation was now based on not disappointing my coach further and not letting my teammate, who was running behind me, or the girl in red beside me, beat me. I guess this isn't entirely true, because I was running in 3rd place (first two girls were way ahead of us) but I didn't have a good attitude about it.
With a lap to go, the three of us were still together. About 15m across the line, the girl in red made a big mistake. She cut me off. That's acceptable on the first lap when we are all trying to get into position, but not on the last lap. She was running beside me and then all of a sudden she's in front of me and I'm slowing down so I don't get tripped. I couldn't believe she cut me off, it made my incredibly mad. And that's where she made her mistake. Because I told myself that whatever I did, I was going to beat her. She cut me off but she wasn't going to be ahead of me at the finish line.
I immediately sped up after the little incident and moved in front of her. The rest of the lap was full of mature racing tactics with us changing places several times and probably cutting each other off. She came around the last corner ahead of me but with 100m to go, we were almost right beside each other (I had no idea of where AK was throughout this). Then we had a little probably at 50m from the line. There were two girls, about to be lapped, running in the middle of lane one and the inside of lane two. The girl in red beside me would go to the right and I knew that if I followed her, she would beat me. On the left of the track was the long jump and was paved but there were some ropes separating it. I could go to the left instead, going outside of the white line but not into the grass. I wasn't sure I could squeeze through without knocking something over or pushing the lapped girl so I didn't know what to do.
I went left and crossed the line less than a second ahead of the girl in red. With a time of 11:53, I took 3rd, while AK had 11:58 in fifth. While we stood in line waiting to turn in our place cards, I refused to congratulate the girl in red because I was still very mad. As she told me good job, I wanted to tell her that because she cut me off, she was standing behind me. Instead, I told her the same and walked away from her quickly.
My coach congratulated us and afterwards we watching JS run a 2:32 split in the 4x800. This made me a little worried because she was feeling good and I wasn't, and I didn't want her to beat me in the 1500m, which we were running together. As AK and I did a one lap cooldown, my legs were feeling tired, and I just wanted to sit and eat. This is not a good attitude going into a race but the meet just didn't seem to be going good. And I still had another race to run, one I wanted to well in.
3000
3rd- 11:53
There's more to come.....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment