Good morning Ags, thought I'd recap day one of the Texas Relays before Day two begins for those who weren't able to watch. Many athletes are unable to compete this weekend due to covid and contact tracing protocols. I wasn't able to go in person yesterday (thanks to moot court stuff for my law school) but hopefully I can provide better feedback with an in person view today after my classes lol!

The day got off to a rocky start in the field events with KJ Grimes fouling all attempts in the hammer and Sam Hankins fouling two and throwing a timid last attempt to miss the finals and our other jav guy William Petersson passed all his attempts, but former Aggie and NCAA champion Maggie Malone won the javelin with a huge throw over 204 feet!

The racing began in the men's 400 where two freshman Omajuwa Etiwe and Brandon Miller qualified to the finals in 4th and 8th place with times of 46.61 and 46.86 respectively! In the women's 400 Tierra Robinson-Jones qualified in 3rd with a 52.83!

In the 400 hurdles, Dominique Mustin was running really well but clipped the 9th hurdle slowing her down as she just missed the finals but still ran under a minute! On the men's side James Smith and Moitalel Mpoke both qualified in second and third place with times of 50.09 and 50.10 respectively. Mpoke has shattered his previous PR twice this season and looked great in the race. Smith started out pretty slowly and didn't have the urgency coming off the hurdles he usually does before picking it up at the end but it wasn't enough.

In the 200 Devon Achane took down a graduate student from North Carolina A&T who's qualified to nationals twice and has a PR of 20.37... that is really telling on Achane's progression so far. He ran 20.72 and qualified to the finals in 3rd. Will be on the inside of Terrance Laird who was runner up indoors, so Achane will have a guy to key on and break for a huge PR! Immanuela Aliu destroyed a talented heat to qualify 4th overall with a huge time of 23.30. She hasn't always looked great indoors, but with her long stride it will pay more dividends outdoors and she will have a great season!

Annie Fuller made her outdoor debut in the 1500 but it was a poor race all around as the pace went out extremely slow and she tried to get around it and ran most of the race in lane 3! She did look great even led at once but all that extra work took effort and slowed her down... but a great rust buster nonetheless. As for the rest of our distance crew... Julia Black and Eric Casarez looked strong in the 5k and our steeplechasers looked good! Zephyr Seagraves started off great but faded just a little, but in a race like the steeple it's hard not to race that for two years, but he should get back to his old self and go sub 9:00 this year. Brady Grant who has just shown great improvement really turned on the heats at the end of the race to place 6th.

Carlton Orange the 800 guy, ran in the mile (yes the mile you read the right) and ran a 4:12 to place 4th! That shows great strength and stamina for someone who runs the 400 and I look for him to come back next 800 and go 1:46 after realizing what he has in the tank after that mile!

But alas onwards to Day Two of the not many relaysTexas Relays... not much going on today for us besides the 100, long jump, pole vault, and discus as our relays won't race until tomorrow in the invitationals!

That is such a dumb way to advance to the finals... wow! Who chooses heat winners when there's that many heats! That's ridiculous

Clarke over 17'8.5!

Something is not right with the jumpers. Too many fouls

The beauty of a God Plan: I wouldn't want to wait until later in the season to qualify our athletes because of the uncertainty of tracing protocols. Yet how beautiful would it be for the 4x400 to break that record during championship season? I recall watching Fred Kerley as a spectator break the collegiate record at UT mid season. These girl could do this thing right here at Collge Station at SECs. Wow - wouldn't that be great! It would be one thing to leave a mark at UT as collegiate record holder and stadium facility record holders but it would be even better to do it at your own stadium when the stakes are high. Not having the collegiate record at SECs in the 4x4 could probably only be topped by doing it in Eugene this year to topple Arkansas for the national championship in Oregon's debut new facility. I watched Jessica do it for us live at Drake for the title but this in Oregon would be spectacular!!!. It would probably almost make waiting through the perennial 50 deg wind at trackside worth it; to have that double-smile of being champions as well as catching the warm trolley back to your hotel; well that's priceless. This would be worth it. I remember meeting Jazmine Fray's mom at NCAAs the year she didn't make it to the finals. That was difficult to bear; the long plane ride between two big burley men inducing a 3 hr blood clot - lol. I have hated losing in Oregon but this could be special this year. Regardless - this will be a historic convergence of settings and memories so this year is worth the popcorn and the prelude to olympic trials. Hang on ppl - WW84 P2; don't hate the sequel Marvel Mag.