Blogs : Eric Simmons

About time at the Armory

Entering the last weekend of qualifying for Division II Indoor Nationals, I had made the provisional standard, but was still too low to even think about going to Nationals. I ran last week at Virginia Tech and improved my time from 48.77 to 48.65. That was not a big improvement, but considering the technical difficulties I had on the bank the race was good in the sense that I felt fast. I knew I needed one more shot to run.

This week, I had one hard workout and just did rehab on Tuesday to Thursday. Fast forward to Friday. I went to the airport, flew to NYC to run at the Armory, ran, and flew back. This was indeed the epitome of a business trip. I must say the Armory is a great facility. Outside of the track being fast, there is a lot of other stuff going on inside of it. There are several stores and stands to shop at, the track meet is ran flawlessly by their event staff, they have a nice,giant "armorytron" with great display, and the national track and field hall of fame is there, which I'm kinda upset I didn't have the opportunity to take in.

Anyway, Coach Mead and I got off the plane at LaGuardia airport and caught a bus across the city to the train, which took us to the Armory. The whole ride took about an hour and I rode past such landmarks as the Apollo. I got to the Armory and chilled out for about an hour before I warmed up. I warmed up for about half and hour earlier than usual because my knee is bugging me and the cramped bus ride did not do anything to help. I checked in and saw that I was in heat 2 of 19 (There were 119 entries) in the quarter, and I had lane 3. The warmup time went by faster than ever it seems, and before I knew it I was setting my blocks on the track. When the gun was shot, I got out harder than I have the past few weeks and came through the 200 at about 22.1 according to Coach Mead. Unlike the past few weeks, I seemed to have a great deal of energy with about 150 left and broke out to lane 2 to make a move on the race leaders. I feel like I could have gone a bit faster, but I waited about 10 meters to make my move because I felt like I would have ran into the guy in front of me as he was kinda wild and wide for the last 100 and I had flashbacks of last year's nationals when I was tripped and missed the finals. The guy from Bethune-Cookman won with 47.55, and when I saw that on the screen I figured I had ran a good enough time to get me into nationals. When 47.94 popped up on the Armorytron, a feeling of happiness came over me that I haven't felt this whole indoor season. I felt like I had been building on something the past few weeks, and it all came to fruition.

I felt great leaving the Armory, except for the transportation parts. We got on the right bus in the wrong direction, saw a woman take shots on the bus, and got harassed by a woman on the plane who confided in us that she was on an acid trip. Anyway, the moral of the story is that I should be going to nationals, and it seems I finally got over whatever mental block was causing me to run poor. I'm sure most people reading this would like to hear more about the acid tripping woman as opposed to me finally running respectable, but the woman was completely trashed on the airplane and the type of language she was spewing to the passengers cannot be displayed on Trackshark. If you want those details, PM me or something. I

Now, we play the waiting game to see if Me, Ahmad in the triple, Lawrence in the hurdles, Jon in the long, and Allison in the 5000 all get in. Thanks for reading, and I'll keep you guys informed.

Untitled Comment

3:24 PM, March 3, 2008 .. Posted by Rome

Congrats on getting over that mental hurdle.Im sure you will be safe enough to go to Minn. Hopefully I will see you out there.

Congrats

4:10 PM, March 3, 2008 .. Posted by ULMSpeeddemon

Congrats on your season best and qualifying for Nationals.

ConGrats

12:36 PM, March 4, 2008 .. Posted by Anonymous

Congratulations, I know how exciting that must feel for you! I will be looking for you at nationals and hope you excel. And by the way your a great writer to be able to describe; I felt like I was there with you when I was reading.

You are on your way

3:12 PM, March 4, 2008 .. Posted by Last JMU all-american(LJ)

You are on your way now, keep that focus and you will be fine.

Untitled Comment

8:32 PM, March 4, 2008 .. Posted by Anonymous

wow, that must've been really hard running the day you flew there and then flying back right afterwards....that's unheard of

Completely unrelated

1:44 AM, March 6, 2008 .. Posted by Brian

Yo, I got some unforgettable pu**y last night. You were probably chillin, drinking smartwater and stretching.