Bethlehem, Pa. – With Isaiah and Jaylen already qualified for States, our main focus was the 4×2 and this week, it was the first event on the docket. We still needed to shave off more than a second to have a chance of making the time or top 20 state-wide. After Jaylen tweaked his hamstring last week, (causing us to scratch at ‘Last Chance’), we were hoping to just get the baton into the hands of the other guys safely. His 23.23 PR lead-off answered that question. Isaiah’s split (second leg) wasn’t great as he had to run in lane two to pass others and hand off in the lead. Smooth exchanges throughout and a PR for Rowan at anchor (23.63) enabled us to get under the standard (1:35.17) with 1:34.58. The time ranks us #9.
Next up was the 60. Ooof. Jaylen made finals but grabbed his leg at the finish and had to sit it out. Then Isaiah got called for a controversial false start. The starter (I was back up starter for this race) called them to ‘set’ before Isaiah was motionless and he popped out early. Normally, as coach, I could have contested the call but as a starter as well?? I was in a spot. Had to go with the call. Conflict of interest. Not a real problem as he’d already made states in this event.
Last week, Chase Bethea went from last to first around the final turn to win his heat and PR 53.47 at 400. That’s becoming his MO apparently. Again, last into the turn, winning the heat almost in lane 3, PR 52.62. All while sporting his ‘Frozone’ space goggles.
Drawing lane 5 for the 200, I knew Isaiah would run faster than he had. His long stride has problems with the turns here. He went after it from the gun and stopped the clock at 22.56. Setting a Wiss indoor flat track record, breaking Darien Williams’ 22.59 from 2016. Our banked record is 22.11 also by D-Willy.
We broke out the retro singlets for the 4×4. (White with the diagonal blue and gold stripe.) Running from the slowest heat based on our season best of 3:40, we went ‘slowest to fastest’ so we could chase. The first three guys PRd (Jouhal 56.92, Bethea 52.50, Aten 54.72) and we won the heat going away in 3:36.60 but way out of the money in tenth place.
This was the first time in years we had all 4 relays in the MOC. The distance guys had 6 PRs out of the 8 legs contested over 2 relays. DMR – Logan Radell 3:51.12 PR, Kam Jouhal 57.31 PR (his first of two PRs on the day), Alex Gobin 2:21.72 PR Evan Vichnin 5:53.01 PR 4×800 – Linville 2:14.18, Schultz 2:17.29, Jishnu Dass 2:22.84 PR, Mike Lambright 2:23.29 PR.