Student shares a Texas-sized experience

March 21, 2012 • Armanae Mathes, guest writer  
Filed under Personalities, Sports

While most people sat at home over the weekend, I was attending the Texas Tech indoor track meet.  Saturday the 18th, I woke up around 6 a.m. to get dressed and the bus left around 7.  There were six of us attending the meet: three seniors, one junior, and two sophomores including myself.  It was a great achievement being invited to go along on the trip.  When we arrived I was excited to see what the inside looked like because I had never been before.

I was unprepared for what I saw; it was large, and the actual track was up the stairs on the second floor.  On top of that, their track was only 200 meters, so for my race I would have to run two laps.  I have never heard of a 400-meter dash including running two laps instead of just one.  I didn’t know how it would affect my running, but I was about to find out.

The good news was that I didn’t have to use blocks, because I’m not very good at them.  However, the bad news was that I would be running in heat 8 for the 400 and heat 22 for the 200.  Imagine my shock that meant over eighty students were running the 400 and even more running the 200.  We were lined up at the starting line, and of course I was nervous because they were all 5A schools!

After the gun went off, signaling us to begin, my adrenaline kicked in, and I took off.  I took the lead and raced to the finish line ending with a time of 65 seconds.  Boy was I tired, but I had to prepare myself for the 200-meter dash.  I took first in both my heats and received twelfth overall in the 400 out of over 80 students!

I was so excited, and my family was there to cheer me on.  After that the coach took us to eat, and then we headed back to Midland.  Even though my legs were sore I knew I would remember this day for a long time.  Also, I had shared this moment with my family who has always been there for me.

Tags: track

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