Harris qualifies for 800m semifinals, Hall advances to LJ final

Harris qualifies for 800m semifinals

Lewiston's Isaiah Harris in his Olympic Trials debut showed he belonged as he won section 3 in 1:47.60. Harris went through the 400m in a relaxed 53.37 which had him in 6th place. With 200m to go Isaiah moved up to 3rd, and with 150m to go the freshman from Penn State made his move. He covered the final 200m in 26.82 as he crossed the line in 1:47.60 to grab one of the theee automatic qualifying spots for the semi's.

"I felt great from 400m on" Harris told MaineTrackXc after his race.

Kate Hall did her thing in the long jump as the former Lake Region HS standout & current Georgia Bulldog qualified for the women's long jump final with a leap of 21-7 1/2.

Hall opened with a 21-5 1/4 leap on her first attempt, she followed up by a 20-3 3/4 mark on her second jump. Kate endured she would make the tomorrow's long jump final with a 21-7 1/2 effort on her final attempt.

The  21-7 1/2 jump came with a 2.2+ wind and ended up being the 8th best mark in the field. Hall will be back tomorrow at 2:45 (PST) to compete in the final.

Hall was pleased with her jumps, "My goal was to be on the board and secure my spot, so now I can relax and focus on bigger things tomorrow."

Cumberland native Ben True finished 11th in the 10k running 29:04.21, True was one of the pre-race favorites to advance to Rio. In 2015 he finished as the US runner-up in the 5k &10k, earning a spot on the World Championship team he would go on to finish 6th in the 5k.

A yo-yo pace and heat appeared to have several victims as 6 athletes didn't finish the race including Hassan Mead, Eric Jenkins & Bernard Lagat. True who was in 6th-7th place for most of the race started to fall off the pace at 7200m, and struggled to the finish.

True will run in the 5k qualifying heats on Monday.

Carsyn Koch competed in the 800m first round as well on day 1, Koch running in section 3 placed 5th running 2:05.57. She finished 31st overall out of 38 competitors. 

Koch who had a personal best of 2:21.30 in HS, won both the indoor/outdoor D2 800m national titles while competing for Cedarville.