Taylor gears for long day
Published Friday, May 11, 2012
By Richard Greene
Northwest's Troy Taylor fights his way to a second-place finish at the Class 5A Region I meet. He will run the 3,200 and 1,600 Saturday. Photo by David Flynn
Saturday will be a long day for Northwest’s Troy Taylor.
He will run the Class 5A 3,200 at 8:20 a.m. and come back 11 hours later to run the 1,600 at the University Interscholastic League championships in Austin.
“After the two-mile I’ll go to the back to hotel so I won’t have to be out there all day,” Taylor said.
But after four years of trying to get to Austin and the state meet, Taylor isn’t complaining about the long day or wait between events.
He qualified for the 3,200 finals, taking second at the Class 5A Region I meet in 9:27.54. He finished third in the 1,600, running 4:17.72 but was the top third-place finisher among the four regions, earning him the ninth-qualifier spot.
Running in the wind and altitude in Lubbock, Taylor recorded the sixth-best regional time. In the mile, he has the fourth-best time.
Taylor can picture himself on the medal stand in both races.
“At state, the mile is going to be a crazy race,” he said. “I have a shot to medal in both, if I run as hard as I can.
“As my coach says, I’m going for broke and holding nothing back.”
