Only two weeks after defeating Exeter, Andover Girls Indoor Track & Field will compete against its rivals again on Wednesday, February 16.
With not only strong starts but multiple strong finishes, the Girls Indoor Track lowerclassmen claimed a win against Marianapolis, Governor’s, Wilbraham & Monson (Wilbraham), and Phillips Exeter Academy in their 9th-10th grade meet. This puts Girls Indoor Track on a three meet winning streak.
According to Hayden Fischer ’25, the team has been able to make progress by learning from this season’s earlier meets. Fischer specified that the team has focused on improving its pacing.
“I think since we’ve had a lot of meets this season, we’ve learned how to pace ourselves throughout the entire race instead of going out really hard, and then dying the last few laps of the race, especially in the distance events,” Fischer said.
According to Lauren Herlihy ’25, working hard in practice has had a strong effect on the team’s distance runners. Herlihy added that speed workouts in particular have helped the runners remain strong throughout the entire race.
“Something that has been helping us out is definitely distance runs … It’s really helpful and it gives a good foundation in basic building like our long-running. And also speed workouts I feel like have helped a lot. That last lap of the race is really important to gain speed and get that extra kick that you need,” Herlihy said.
Patricia Tran ’24 highlighted the upperclassmen on the track team for coming to the meet and showing support for the underclassmen. The energy supplied by the upperclassmen propelled the team forward, according to Tran, leading to a successful meet.
“I think the support from the upperclassmen was just one thing because the upperclassmen weren’t racing so I think their goal was to make an environment where the 9th and 10th graders felt more included and so they did really well because there was a lot of energy and a lot of good support,” Tran said.
Herlihy gave appreciation to Fischer, who ran both the 600-meter and 1000-meter. Herlihy emphasized Fischer’s strength on the track, alongside her positive energy as a teammate.
“I thought a person who did well was Hayden Fischer. She ran the girls 600 and 1000. And I ran both meets with her and she absolutely crushed it on both. In both events, she got the girls’ freshman record… And she’s been killing it in practice and killing it in all the meets. I’m really proud of her, and she’s such a great teammate. She cheers everyone on. She is just a really positive person and I’m really impressed,” Herlihy said.
According to Tran, the team’s race strategy could drastically improve the outcome of the meets. She specified that the team needs to improve on race strategy to get better.
“I think consistency, I guess this is more distance-related, but just getting more consistent splits every single lap so then you can PR. Also, more race strategy. [At] this meet we were just trying to hit splits but Exeter kind of caught us off guard with a really good race strategy. And [its] goal was not to like PR or anything, their goal was just to get points. I think if we had a better race strategy, then we would have done better,” Tran said.
Girls Indoor Track hopes to add another win to their record this Wednesday against Exeter.
