Former Haybaler clocks personal best time at Big Sky Indoor
Championships in Idaho
Pocatello, Idaho
For a distance runner who had never competed in an indoor 5,000-meter race, the advice Amanda Boyd received was somewhat obvious.
For Boyd, a 2006 graduate of San Benito High School, her longest distance indoors had been two miles, approximately 1.1 miles short of what she was planning on running at the Big Sky Indoor Championships, which took place on Feb. 29 and March 1 at Idaho State University in Pocatello.
Competing for Northern Arizona, the recommendation Boyd received was similar to a “don’t look down” approach for someone battling vertigo.
“Going into it I was like, ‘Oh my God. It’s 25 laps,'” Boyd said. “My coach told me not to look at the lap-counter until 10 minutes into the race. Once we got past the first 10 minutes of the race, that’s when it mattered – the last 2K.”
The distance was perhaps mind-boggling, but it didn’t seem to affect Boyd, who finished second in the Big Sky with a personal best time of 17:34.28. She came in behind Mattie Bridgmon of Eastern Washington, whose 17:27.63 earned her a gold medal.
“The girl who beat me, her race is the 5,000 meters,” Boyd said. “By the end of the race, I still had a lot left … I felt really good. It’s good to learn that I can take it out at a faster pace at the beginning and still have enough in the end.
“It was fun. I liked it.”
Due to the amount of stress on the body, the 5,000 meters does not occur during the regular season, and qualifying for it is based on your time in the 3,000 meters.
Boyd qualified for the Indoor Championships in the 3,000 meters as well, and took seventh with a time of 10:05.77, approximately three seconds off her personal record.
While times on an indoor track are typically slower than outdoors, and with Boyd never having truly trained for the 5,000, she’s already considering a push for the longer distance race when the outdoor season starts in the upcoming weeks.
To qualify for the outdoor regional championships in the 5,000, Boyd said, a time of 16:52 is needed. Although she was unaware of the 3,000 qualifying time, she did point out that the 3,000 meter steeple chase time was 10:54.
Currently, her converted time is 9:53, and with the steeple chase portion adding approximately 40 seconds, she’s already in good shape.
“It comes down to building up to outdoors and regionals and eventually nationals,” Boyd said. “When you want to be really peaking is come April, May, and hopefully June (for nationals).”
Boyd, a sophomore, redshirted her freshman year after a sciatic nerve in her lower back kept her out for much of the season.
But while long-distance running is certainly not the cure for a lower-back problem, few can argue Boyd’s reason for continuing to run.
“I love distance running,” she said.
