IPHS freshman seventh at state meet

by Kevin Hamilton
For many qualifiers to the Texas UIL State Track and Field Championships, the full impact of making it to “The Show” doesn’t hit them until they are paraded from the staging area down the track to the starting line with thousands of faces staring back at them.

The packed and colorful throngs of spectators often causes the adrenaline to start pumping, and the head to swim with countless, sometimes distracting thoughts.

And often, well-thought-out game plans slip out the back door as a result of the distractions.

According to the father of Iowa Park’s Bethany Hale, the impact of being in Mike A. Myers Stadium on the University of Texas campus hit the freshman 800-meter runner enough to throw her off her normal routine.

The Lady Hawk runner finished seventh in the girls 3-A event at 2:22.25, over six seconds slower than her winning time two weeks earlier in the regional meet at Lubbock.

“It probably got to her more than she would have liked,” said her father, Brett, a former track star for IPHS. “It was the biggest competition she has ever been to. And she didn’t run the kind of race she wanted. She was very upset. But she is the kind of person who will take the experience as a challenge for her future years in high school.”

Dallas Madison’s Simone Brickley didn’t help things for Hale or the other six finalists in the Saturday afternoon race under hot and humid conditions, breaking free of the pack early and leading by over 20 meters after the first of two laps.

For Hale, who was to that point unbeaten in a three-year stretch running the 800 meters in junior high, high school and at summer TAAF meets, it was also a new experience to not be leading the race from early on.

Brickley kept the lead and won gold with a time of 2:09.81, setting a new Conference 3A record in the process. Brickley later captured her second gold of the day in the 400-meter dash.

Cara Patterson of Devine took silver in the 800 meters with a time of 2:18.86, and Milca Villegas of Fort Worth Carter-Riverside the bronze (2:19.54).

Placing fourth was Talea Turner of Waco Connalley (2:21.33); Tazna Roy of Palacios fifth (2:21.36); Decatur’s Bianca Morrison sixth (2:22.16); and, Amanda Drake of Diboll eighth (2:35.20).

“We told Bethany it is up to her what she does from here, and whatever it is she chooses to do we will support,” Brett said. “Right now she wants to run. Her goal this summer is to break the state TAAF record in her age group, and play soccer. In the fall, she plans to run cross country again (Hale and her Lady Hawk teammates qualified for the state meet last year). And hopefully, in the spring she will make another trip to Austin.”

And with it, a year more of rich experiences for the talent-rich athlete from Iowa Park.