Andrea Nelson at Richland
Andrea Nelson has competed in 4 invitationals this year
She went head to head with Bellarmines, Nicole Cochran and Kayla Evans, Sandra Martinez of Davis and Baylee Mires of Mead, Bronwyn Crossman of Squalicum and the Redmond duo , Sarah Lord and Devon McMahon
This list of girls comprises the top tier of an impressive list of athletes to watch for in the coming weeks contests.
She has consistently and repeatedly held her own and dominated, performance after performance against these great athletes.
She has placed first in every invitational she has run this year.
She shattered the Mt Baker course record now set at 17.22.52
She is a Sophomore!
Andrea Nelson, in spite of being only a sophomore, has been a common name in the Washington High School running arena.
As a freshman she placed 5th in the 1600 ,5:00.56and 3rd in the 3200, 10:48.24
She also took 2cnd at the 4A State XC Meet, 18:16
These performance are impressive and were delivered in the midst ofolder and more experienced runners.
Andrea may be young but she does not show any evidence of inexperience, lack of confidence or fear of success.
She runs on shear delight, ambition and determination. I asked her about race strategies, technique, plans, the competition. In a refreshing way, she related that she did not spend to much time on the details of what to do and what not to do, she ran with pure instinct, relying on her gut more than here head.
She doesn’t waste time or effort over analyzing things. She really doesn’t need to. She has a successful race formula that works for her and works repeatedly and consistently.
My interviews with this years’ young runners have this thread in common, Ruby Roberts and Andrea both embrace their races with the same pure enthusiasm. Both enter the race, just to see how fast they can go and how much they can push themselves.
Andrea has come thru the last 2 seasons with some outlines, however.
Her 3200 State meet, although she placed 3rd was a racing disappointment for her, she deferred to the experience of the older Nicole Cochran of Bellarmine and Kesslee Payne of Gig Harbor and respectfully settled in behind them waiting for the older and assumably more aggressive runners to set the tone of the race. In the end, Andrea felt she hung back too long and did not perform at her best. She admitted she probably would have still placed third but the times and pace would have been much faster with her in more control of the outcome.
Her races since then have seem to be patterned around this issue.
She has gone out early and fast, set the bar and forced other athletes to defer to her. To this date No one has been able to get in her way. This plan, developed from one racing disappointment, seems to be the winning ticket for Andrea.
Andrea ran at the Richland Invite this Saturday Oct 06.
She went out pushing the pace opening a lead by the first mile., Baylee Mirsr was with her thru the first mile and into the long push on the other side. Baylee seemed to be taking her to task but by the 1.5 mile point had dropped off. Andrea pushed harder and by mile 2 , Baylee lost the second position to the Redmond Duo of Sarah Lord and Devon McMahan.
Andre worked on pushing this section of the race and did not allow the Redmond athletes to gain on her.
By the end Andrea Nelson won again, with a 30 sec lead, against some of the top runners in the state, in one of the biggest invitationals of the season.
Andrea sets the pace and runs like she plans to wins and expects to win.
The Regional contest start next week, the Districts the following week and the State X-C meet will be held at Sun Willows Golf Course, at Pasco on Nov 3
