Gamecocks host home meet, prepare for conference championships
In track and field, the difference between first and second place can be mere seconds. The difference between those seconds is an athlete’s ability to will himself past his opponent, a trait coach Curtis Frye said takes “effort” and “heart.”
“[For] somebody who shows effort and heart, it won’t be time,” Frye said. “It’s effort and heart that competes extremely hard.”
With a tough stretch coming up, South Carolina will look to put those qualities into action in this weekend’s Gamecock Invitational as it begins to prepare for next week’s SEC Indoor Championships.
“The way it stands, the SEC is a tough place to evaluate,” Frye said. “If you talk about projections, where we’re going to be, a whole lot of things we hope can change this week. We’re trying to fight our way into the top half of the SEC.”
Saturday’s meet in Columbia will give the Gamecocks one last tune-up before the big competition in Fayetteville, Ark.
Several team members have come close to automatically qualifying for the NCAA Championships by falling just short of the required mark. One such example is the men’s 1600-meter relay team comprised of All-American Andre Carter, Clayton Gravesande, Antonio Sales and Aaron Anderson, which missed its qualifying time by three seconds.
With SECs nearly upon them, Carter is confident he and the rest of the team will be in the running for the top honors.
“I think we’re going to place in the top five. We’ve got a pretty young but strong team,” Carter said. “At the same time, we’ve got Antonio Sales running the 200-meter and also helping with the 4x4 (relay). We have three quarter runners — me, Clayton Gravesande and Aaron Anderson, who’s also contributing to the 4x4.”
Having lost many of last year’s top runners to the pros, Frye believes the men have a challenge on their hands.
“It’s going to be really difficult for our men’s team like it was last time for our women,” Frye said. “We don’t have the quality that we had last year. It’s going to take a lot of effort and overachievement for a lot of our kids, and this week sets it up with this home track meet. We’ll get some kids to step to the front like we did last week.”