Co-Ed Dual vs. Lake Forest

After a crazy day of weather on Tuesday, we finally got the chance to race outdoors on Wednesday. Since the meet was rescheduled and we could only get one official, we ran the meet co-ed. It was great to have the energy of the guy's team!

Although the wind was blowing hard and the temperatures were cold (especially when the sun hid), the Bees stepped up BIG!  There were a TON of athletes who had their first meet ever!  There were also a lot of improved performances. Here's who stood out:

In the throws, Ximena had a great day!  She threw a three-foot PR in the shot and OWNED her greatness afterward!  Part of becoming a great athlete is to take care of all aspects of your performance. Owning your improvements and celebrating breakthroughs really matters! After her performance, she asked for a shout out on the blog; I cannot love that enough! Keep up the positivity, Ximena. Speaking of positivity, Strickland told me that Arianna had such a positive mindset, too, throwing much further than she did in practice this week!  So glad to have Arianna as part of our throws crew because she shares that positive mindset that Ximena displays.

In the jumps, we had some great news. Nyanna B. returned to the sand, jumping well in the long jump!  Glad to see you shining, Nyanna! Brooke and Grace made their long jump debuts, doing an awesome job for their first time in competition. Nice job, newbees!  Katelin struggled in the long jump, but she reset and had an awesome effort in the triple jump! She put together a lifetime PR of 29'7.5".  Sweet performance, Kate! Mary scored a point for us in the high jump, despite the wind. Nice work, Mary!

On the track, we had SO many strong performances. Here are the ones that really stood out to me:

• In the 100, there were 37 runners.  Whew!  Kennilyn, Auriel, Niyanna, Nala, and Jada all came in the top 10!  Awesome work!
• In the 200, Kennilyn really stepped up to place 3rd and earn us a point in the event. Lanay showed off her tenacity by pushing into the top 10 out of 30.  
• In the 400, Anesa had a great day, earning a new Lifetime PR--awesome work, Junior! She is way ahead of her best performance from last year. And shout out to Abygail for racing against the boys in their heat! 
• In the 800, shout out to Juliana for earning a new LPR and for earning us a point in 3rd place. She ran a gutsy race!
• In the 1600, Lauren led the race from gun to tape with a really courageous performance. Nice work, Lauren!  And Melanie broke through her comfort zone, running a HUGE LPR, dropping over 30 seconds from her previous best. Awesome work, Mel!
• In the 3200, Liz stepped up to represent us in a crazy race (we combined the 4X800 and the 3200). She did a great job debuting in this event, running even splits and working hard the whole time!  So proud of you, Liz!
• In the 100 hurdles, both Tati and Sierra-Rayne didn't let trip-ups stop them. So proud of them both for overcoming the setback!
  In the 300 hurdles, Rachel and Tati did an awesome job tackling this longer race. Proud of you two!  :)
• Our 4X100 relay beat Lake Forest in fine form. I know that they will continue to improve as they get their handoffs down.  

Overall, it was a good day to see the whole team finally get a chance to show off on the track and in the field.  I know that the conditions weren't great, but my hope is that we will learn from them!  Warming up is SO IMPORTANT in order for your body to perform the way you want it to.  Compared to indoor, you will likely need to do much more event prep in order to stay warm and injury-free. Looking forward to seeing you all compete at home on Monday.  Until then, stay positive and take care of yourselves!

FYI, Audrey's mom and Jalen's (from the boys' team) dad both got some awesome pictures at the meet. They posted the pictures on our Facebook page. You should check them out!  Search up Zion Benton Cross Country and Distance Crew. And if you see them, thank them for documenting our meet!