Long Beach City College’s track & field qualified for regionals after overcoming the South Coast Conference Championship on Apr. 27.
“They actually came out and competed during the whole track meet. Normally they don’t take it as serious, so this meet, they really came out and did their lifetime best,” Karen Vigilant, women’s head coach said.
The new mentality showed in this race for the Vikings, especially for freshman hurdler Amareah Hamilton when she secured first place in the women’s 100m hurdles race.
“Some of them PR’d (personal record) and I think this was a spark to let them realize ‘hey, I can really run’ and a lot of them ran faster this weekend than they ran in their high school careers,” Vigilant said.
Hamilton made sure to put the burners on as she torched the race with a time of 14.40 seconds, with fellow teammate Aniyah Wyche finishing in third place with a 15.15 second time.
Freshman shot-putter Sarayah Harris-Davis also shined in the competition as her strength was unmatched, muscling her way to first place in the women’s shot-put competition.
Harris-Davis did not hold back on her attempt, throwing the ball at a distance of 11.84 meters, which was more than almost two feet ahead of second-place finisher Dimitra Vitogiannis of Cerritos.
The relay runners showed off their true skills, finishing with high-placed rankings in each relay race.
Even though the vikings may not have gotten first place in the relay events, their high-place rankings gave them a good amount of points for the Vikings squad which also helped them secure third place for both the men’s and women’s teams.
The women scored 112 points at the event and the men scored 84.33 points, with both rosters falling behind second place Cerritos and first place Mt. San Antonio.
The workhorse mentality that Vigilant talked about helped LBCC with the third-place overall finish for both the men’s and women’s team, helping ignite the spark that was needed to finish in the top three.
“Both teams finished third overall in this meet and that was a goal we had as coaches, to get all of our athletes prepared to make a run and be top three in the conference. Understanding that it’s a team goal and not an individual goal reflected upon our student-athletes when us coaches really bought in and supported each other and I think that was the difference this year over other years,” Men’s Track and Field Coach Marcus Carroll said.
The Vikings are all amped up and ready to go as they prepare for the regional prelims on May 3 and the finals on May 10, both taking place at Cerritos College.