Wednesday 4/24 – Andover: , Austin Prep: , Landmark:
Track and Field (3-0) hosted its first home meet of the season on Wednesday, where many new runners experienced their first PATF track meet. While the event was filled with some weather-related issues, anticipation, excitement, and support was still high throughout the entire team.
According to Murathimae Daisley ’26, when runners at Wednesday’s meet did not think that the conditions could become any worse with all of the wind and rain, the power went out and the races had to be timed by hand.
“The power actually went out. The timing was horrible because the weather was really bad. In the beginning, it was downpouring, and the wind was crazy, and then, all the power went out so all the timing machinery just shot down, so then they had to get out hand timing, so it was a really big process,” said Daisley.
According to Sarah Bae ’26, both teams were all ready to compete and do their best, however the weather did not cooperate as expected. Despite the weather, the athletes and officials at the race adapted well and worked to continue the meet.
“Because of the unfortunate weather and rain, a crucial moment is right before the 100-meter hurdle race. We were not sure if the meet would continue. But then the officials worked well together and made a great effort to keep the meet on. And the meet ended up being hand-timed.” said Bae.
Bae also shared that despite the turn of events, morale and energy were maintained throughout the very end of the race.
“The strengths of the team were working together and just being there for each other. And especially you can feel the energy at the last [event] of the day, the 4×4 [relay]. Our Captain Max Huang [’24] actually said that it was his teammates who helped him through the last stretch” said Bae.
Similarly, Max Krasovsky ’27 noted how all of the hard work done by new runners finally paid off at their first meet.
“For a lot of kids, this was their first meet since we had two home meets canceled. So it was a lot of work up to this point, and everything in general like conditioning, just getting better at sprinting for the kids running for the first time. So, it was just a lot of work that came into this meet,” said Krasovsky.
Krasovsky highlighted the support on the homestretch of an exerting race helped seal the deal across the finish line.
Krasovsky said, “Something that happens a lot on some of the longer events, on the back stretches, there’s a lot of people supporting the team. I would say, especially in those harder races where you’re getting gas, it helps a lot. Overall, we had a good meet today. A lot of good plays and a lot of them were had because of the support from the team in like those hard moments.”
Correspondingly, Daisley described how the dynamic of the event was truly amazing and new since the entire track team was together for the first time.
Daisley said, “So this was our first full team meeting. It was the first, not just varsity meet, so it was really awesome to see all the JV kids and just the whole program coming together. Honestly, so many people showed up, both varsity and JV.”
Track and Field will travel with a select group of athletes to Black Bear Invitational on Saturday.
