Follow Lake Region HS sprint/jump star Kate Hall as she blogs about her senior outdoor season & the quest to be the best. Hall was the indoor national long jump champion this winter. Her accolades are impressive, she has never lost a state championship race or jump, a perfect 23-23 so far. She currently holds Maine State Indoor All-time bests in the 55m, 60m, 200m, & long jump. Outdoors she holds all-time best marks in the 100m, 200m & long jump
Hello everyone!
I just got done looking at all of the Big 12 and SEC results from this past weekend. What I find really cool is how I know most of the girls who came in the top five in long jump and the 100m from my recruiting visits. A girl who I jumped against at nationals my junior year and then hung out with at UGA on my visit won the triple jump by two feet. She jumped 46-4, which so happens to be the third best in the world right now....and she’s a freshman at Georgia. The cool part is that I have her number so I got to personally congratulate her. Also, looking at these results and seeing how well the girls that I have competed against are doing really motivates and inspires me to do well for the remainder of the season and in the future.
Anyways, the bigger meets are just around the corner and I couldn’t be more excited! It’s so tough competing in the regular season when there is ALWAYS a huge wind in my face. It seemed like the season was dragging on only because of the fact that the weather was preventing me from doing what I know I can do. However just when I thought I wasn’t going to do anything majorly exciting in the regular season, I jumped 20-5. That definitely took me by surprise considering it was a cold, windy day and I wasn’t in peaking mode yet. My first jump was 19-6, but I was a foot behind the board. My second jump I barely fouled, although I got a crazy amount of height and definitely think it was a 21 foot jump if I hadn’t fouled. My third was when I jumped 20-5 and was perfect on the board, and my last I wasn’t quite on the board and jumped 20-3. So technically, even though 20-5 was my best jump, it was actually my worst considering my other ones were further if I was on the board. I think that was just what I needed to get me excited again. It proved to me that it truly was the weather that was affecting me in other meets and that I’m only getting better as the season progresses.
I’m just beginning to start my peaking phase. I have been holding back on doing jumping practice/plyometrics because my knee has been bothering me. Over the past month my trainer has been having me do a lot of eccentrics to help my knee along with some stretches to help me gain a bit of flexibility. I really felt the benefit of both of these things for the first time last Friday when I was able to get my feet out further in my landings. Other than that, there’s nothing new in my training besides the fact that everything has felt better than ever. I am so anxious to see what the rest of this season holds and I hope everyone has a GREAT rest of their seasons!
