Neveah Cachora felt all the emotions through her race.
“It was, me giving up on myself, or just telling myself that I could do it,” Cachora said.
But Cachora, a sophomore at Española Valley High School, pushed through and placed fifth in the girls 3200 meters with a time of 12 minutes, 9 seconds at the state track and field championships in Albuquerque on May 18. She brought down her time by nearly 20 seconds from her previous best, and by nearly 50 seconds from the start of the year.
The day before, in the 1600 meters, Cachora got trapped early on in the back of a pack, and was unable to make up ground in a ninth-place finish, though with a strong time of 5:38.
This time, she made sure to get off to a quicker start to try to get closer to the front of the pack. And it paid off, as she spent most of the race in a pack of three, behind the top three. That propelled her well as she ultimately took a fifth-place finish.
Cachora battled the elements of a sweltering afternoon in Albuquerque for a distance race.
“The track is hot, my body is hot, it’s just hot in general,” Cachora said.
Española qualified a sprint medley relay team of Katie Alire and Averi Schultz running 200-meter legs, Hailey Renteria running the 400, and Cachora finishing with the 800-meter leg. The quartet placed second the week before at the district championships.
With a small team, forming relays has been a struggle for Española throughout the year. They ran a medley relay at the first meet of the year, and the district meet was just their second time running the relay.
Needing a top-two finish to qualify for state, Cachora passed Moriarty’s runner in the last 10 meters, and won out by half a second.
“I was so tired during that 800,” Cachora said. “I had to learn how to push through. Not only see what I can do, but see what we can do as a team.”
They ultimately placed ninth in the preliminaries, with a time of 4:38.31, four seconds off of qualifying for the final. Most of their splits were personal bests.
“It was just us thinking about our time,” Cachora said. “For us to push ourselves, not only in practice, but in the meet.”
With two juniors and two sophomores on that team, they hope to return next year, and have a full season to work on their team race.
“We know what our bodies can do,” Alire said. “It helped us have more confidence to come out here and do our thing.”
“State is ours next year,” Schultz said.
Victor Parra qualified for Española in the high jump. But he failed to clear the opening mark at 5 feet, 6 inches. On his third attempt, he pulled up in front of the bar, and ultimately ran out of time.
Parra said that the concrete messed up his timing, and he was approaching too fast on that attempt.
Española has struggled in recent years to get many competitors in track and field. Parra has stuck it out, improving as an athlete, even though other competitors from last year’s state meet did not run with the team this year.
“Just motivation,” Parra said. “Wanting to do better for myself. Just trying to do better, be great. If you do, like basketball, football, volleyball, softball, track helps with all those sports.”