Yesterday’s meet at Santa Clara was kind of a test of how much you like track & field. The meet was well run (Coach Julie L’Heureux runs a great meet and we were done at 6pm, under three hours from the start), so we were moving all the time. But the meet was hand time so results are not as accurate as an FAT meet–this is not a meet where you are necessarily going for your PR that is going on your all-time record. This was very old school (when your coach ran high school track, this is the way every meet was run). We were just out competing–running hard, competing against our opponents, but more importantly against the little voice inside our heads. Motivation has to come from within during a hand-timed meet; it’s easy for the little voice in your head to make excuses: ‘The time is going to be unofficial, why bother trying, you have a little headache anyway, tell the coach you want to skip the event or just not show up or don’t try’. So all of us that are out there really competing–that means we love track!
And why shouldn’t we love our sport? Look what we get to do all day!–run our hardest, jump as far as we can, feel our muscles strain and our lungs burn, watch our friends compete, and be home while it is still light in time for dinner, some homework, and go to bed feeling great!
There was some really fun stuff to see. Julia Chang finally got back to racing after battling a foot injury and recorded a hand-timed 5:38, which would be a 4-second PR (she will get the FAT mark soon)! Sanat Sangamalli threw the shot 38’11”, winning his event while setting a PR, and Aarohi Palkar PRed in both shot and disc. Mike Sakellar tried the long jump for the first time, just missing 18′ for the longest jump by an MV athlete in more than a year). Giselle Kaneda scored 13 points for the Varsity Girls with wins in the triple and long jump and a second in the 100m high hurdles (why don’t we get this girl in our 4x100m relay???). Our varsity boys 4×100 team recorded a 46.0 time–last year’s best was 45.38 FAT–with some hard off work, why can’t this team of beasts break 44 and maybe head to sectionals this year?–that would be a nice way for us to send off the seniors!
And Rohan Choudhury–he just knows how to win a race. If you want to watch someone who can tell his little voice to shut up and get out of the way, watch Rohan at the end of a race. All in, every time, committed to the race and doing his best. We all enjoyed watching Rohan close out the 4x400m–great race!
I love this sport. As most of you know, I still race myself, not for a team but just because I like the way it feels, I like the satisfaction of defeating the little voice inside my head. I like getting up before dawn on Thursdays and meeting my (old!) friends for a track workout, just because. When I see all of you out there hammering away in a dual meet against Santa Clara, hand timed, with your teammates for an audience, I think that many of you are falling in love with track too–and that in 30 years, when I’m in the 80 and over age group and you guys are in the 40-49 group, I’ll be able to find someone to drive to the races!
Photos taken by Mr. Ma and Coach Flatow are on the team Picasa site–there are some good shots, check out some of the hurdle exchanges and high jump photos. You probably will find something for your FB page!
Team Scores
Varsity Boys: Santa Clara 77, Monta Vista 50
Varsity Girls: Monta Vista 69, Santa Clara 58
Frosh-Soph Boys: Monta Vista 72, Santa Clara 54
Junior Varsity Girls: Monta Vista 85, Santa Clara 24
Photos of hand-timed score sheets with top three finishers and marks are below:
