Adrienne Francisco

A hurdle.  

A distance. 

An injury.

Track and field athletes face several obstacles and setbacks throughout their season. However, the start of this season has not been like most. 

Due to the construction on the campus field, the track athletes have been attending their practices at the First Colony Middle School track, while pole vaulters practice at Mercer Stadium. Both the coaches and athletes have been adjusting to the unfamiliar circumstances.

“Our big challenges this year are being off campus, since we don’t have a track here, and working with our feeder schools,” Coach Jason Haddock said. “We’re not able to carry as big of a team as we normally are.”

Due to the lack of a track on campus, the coaches have formed “developmental groups” this season, which means that there is a significant amount of athletes practicing, without being able to participate in track and field meets.

“We’ve had to, just for numbers sake, divide up the kids that we feel could be more successful as a travel team, and then kids that are in the developmental group,” Coach Jessica Kelm said. “So there’s not that kind of camaraderie amongst the whole track program.”

Not only are practices being held off campus, but they also start much later than in previous years.

“So essentially, we can’t get to First Colony until 4:15 p.m.,” Coach Cade Laufer said. “There is kind of this dead period between now [end of school] and when the bus leaves at 3:30 p.m. They also have the four lane tracks. So, there’s the high school kids with the junior high trying to coordinate.”

In addition to the scheduling issues, the athletes themselves have faced their own personal obstacles.

 “At the start of the season, I basically got a bone bruise, and it left me with tendonitis,” senior Olivia Smith said. “So that was definitely a challenge, but going to the trainers and getting physical therapy definitely helped.”

Despite the division within the team, senior Yijia Gao has not felt discouraged.

“It is my first year on track so it’s really different from what I am used to, but I feel like I’m still going to have a lot of fun this year and I’m looking forward to running track with my peers,” Gao said.

Senior Rayan Khan said that overall, the team has been consistent and “off to a good start.” 

“I think the most challenging part in the preseason is getting your discipline back to where it needs to be,” Khan said. “I think after not running for a while, it gets hard to get back into the motions. So, it’s really important that you just start practicing consistently.”

In spite of the physical and mental roadblocks, the track team exhibits resilience to achieve their goals and meet their expectations.

“My goal is to beat my personal record and to execute my own race, and just to not really focus on what other people in our district are running, but on being the best version of myself,” Smith said.