Austin's injury has been healing after his work with the PT and not running for about 3 weeks, which has taken us to the middle of the track season. Since it's his junior year, he's been getting anxious to get back into it, but waiting patiently until the "ok" from his PT.
For the dual meet last Tuesday, his PT said he could run the 800, two laps around the track, and go all out, just to see how his healed hip would do. So Austin trained for one day before the meet.
Well, Austin took his advice and went all out, getting a 7-second PR of 2:02! For the 800, that much of a PR after an injury is incredible! It was helpful for all that 3 of his friends were right there with them. The two Salem boys are the best 800 runners on our team, and I know they wanted to stay with Austin, who had just come out of an injury, and Austin was on his runner's high. The other runner is a mutual friend from Canton. He took #2 in the state in XC in 2024 and has become close with our runners because he's the only one on his team who is serious. Watching them finish within seconds of each other was so exciting!
Coach gave Austin the best compliment of all time after this race. He said, "That was one of the best mental performances I have seen in my entire career." I thought a compliment from his teammate was pretty funny as well. Referring to Austin's incredible PR after an injury and no practice, Sam said, "You @*# hole! Why did you have to run so fast?!" In his loving, friend kind of way.
So today, at the invitational, Austin was placed in the 4x800 (the relay for the 800, where each of 4 runners runs an 800). That's the only race he ran, as he still probably needs more training before he competes in his usual 1600 and 3200. The problem is, there's not much of the season left, and he doesn't really want to run the 800 much more because it will take away from the other two races.
Hopefully, he can run the 1600 next week!
