AT THE New York Relays, held at Ichan Stadium, the boys outdoor track team competed against teams from both in and around New York State. Despite the fierce competition, they placed in the top fifteen in many events. Furthermore, the 4 X 800 meter relay team, comprised of sophomores Muhamed Bicic and Justice Williams and juniors Abdoulaye Diallo and Dysron Marshall, clenched second place by breaking the previous Townsend Harris school record in their event. In doing so, they successfully qualified for not one, but three national elite meets: Penn Relays, New Balance Nationals, and the Adidas Grand Prix.

In the 4 X 800 meter run, Justice shaved six seconds off his previous personal best in the first leg, running with a time of 2:01. Muhamed continued upon with the strong start by setting a personal record of 2:00 to complete the second leg. He handed the baton to Dysron, who ran the third leg with a time of 2:03, beating his previous personal record by four seconds. Abdoulaye ran the anchor leg to close the race, sealing second place for the boys with an 800 meter split time of 1:57. Overall, they finished with a time of 8:03, smashing the previous school record by 17 seconds. Their performance ranks them second in all of New York State.

“We performed exceptionally well in the relay,” Abdoulaye said. “We were seeded tenth with a time of 8:20 and, with our collaborative effort, finished second with a time of 8:03. I was blown away by every athlete in the relay performance. Watching Justice PR, then Muhamed PR, and then Dysron PR, gave me immense motivation to try my hardest as anchor leg. The relay went from only being competitive on a city level to being competitive on a state level.”

In other events, the team set numerous personal records and placed well. Justice placed 14th out of 54 runners in the 400 meter hurdles with a time of 1:00. Furthermore, Abdoulaye, Dysron, Justice, and junior Aidan Moran placed ninth of out of 29 teams with a time of 3:54 in the varsity speed medley relay. In the 2000 meter steeplechase, senior captain Yash Sharma placed 14th out of 28 runners by setting a new school record of 6:56. He beat the previous record, which had not been surpassed for six years, by 15 seconds.

“I went into that race with the goal of breaking the record, but I wasn’t expecting to do so well. That was my only chance to break it, since this is the only meet where varsity athletes run the 2000 meter steeplechase; it’s usually 3000 meter,” Yash said. “The race itself went a lot better than I had expected. It was pretty awesome to break that record. I had one chance to do it, and I’m glad everything went well.”

To prepare for the upcoming elite meets, the boys of the 4 X 800 meter relay team intend to push themselves harder than ever before in order to do well.

Muhamed concluded, “It’s an honor to be running at such meets because it gives us a chance to run out of our comfort zones and really get our names out there to college scouts. We will go back to training harder and really sharpening our weak points in order to run faster. This performance was a great confidence booster for all of us which goes to show that fighting through adversity on the track will help reach your future endeavors.”