Jesse Fayant of Spokana Mead in Washington traveled over 2000 miles to take on the best in Texas. Fayant took an early lead, coming through the first half mile in 2:09, and never looked back. The kid from Washington came through the halfway point in the race in 4:29, right on pace for a 9 minute 3200. However, a 70 second 5th lap caused him to fall off of pace and he was never able to get himself back under 9 minute 3200 pace. Fayant proceeded to run away from the field finishing in an amazing 9:04. Just 5 hours after running an unbelievable 4:11 in the 1600, Leonel Manzano of Marble Falls came back to run an amazing 3200 to capture second in 9:07. The super sophomore came through the mile mark in 4:35 and in fifth place, running behind Jeff Cutrer of Nederland and Chase Hall of Jenks, Oklahoma. With 250 left in the race, Manzano overtook Cutrer, who had fallen to third, and proceeded to chase down Hall. After running neck and neck with Hall, Manzano threw in a final surge to pass Hall with 150 left. Manzano was able to run a 60 second final 400 meters, coming up 3 seconds short of catching Fayant. Hall held on to run 9:08.
Long Beach Wilson High School from California came up 2 seconds short of breaking their own meet record set last year in the Girls 1600 Sprint Medley Relay. Thanks to a 2:13 anchor leg, Wilson was able to run an incredible 3:57, which is the fastest time in the nation this year. Kelly Cordell of Houston Memorial ran an impressive 2:16 on the anchor leg for her team, taking them from 7th to 3rd in the final 400 meters.
Thanks to an unbelievable 44.8 split by Kelly Willie and a 1:55 split by Marion Harper, Houston Sterling was able to hold of a 1:53 split by Tomas Finol and his team from Klein. Even though Klein's 400 runner ran a 48.1 split, it was nothing compared to Willie's 44 second split, which gave Houston Sterling a 2 second lead heading into the final leg. Running in his second 800 ever, Marion Harper of Houston Sterling ran 1:55 to Tomas Finol's 1:53, beating Finol to the finish line in one of the most exciting races of the day. When asked about his 44 second split, Kelly Willie responded, "It was a little unexpected, but I felt with the workouts we've been doing that I was prepared to run, I just didn't know how fast."
Kicking off Saturday's events was the Girls' Distance Medley Relay. Jumping out to an early lead was Megan Radermacher of Klein running a 3:39. Megan opened up a monstrous lead with 200 meters left in the first leg before handing off to her teammate. Klein proceeded to run away from the field and thanks to a 2:18 by Shannon Radermacher, Klein had a 5 second lead on Jenks, Oklahoma. However, a 5:17 anchor by Shawna Florida was not enough to hold off a hard charging Rachel Barber from Jenks. Barber ran a 77 second third lap to catch Florida, and closed in a 66 seconds for her final 400 meters to capture the victory for Jenks. After running her first 800 in 2:43, Barber pulled off an amazing second half to run 5:06 on her leg.
One of the most stacked fields in recent history entered the Boy's Distance Medley Relay. With Klein, Nederland, and The Woodlands all entered, the Texas Relays Record was in jeopardy. Todd Van Velson of Nederland jumped out to an early lead, running the lead off leg in 3:08, followed by Jon Norris of The Woodlands in 3:09. However, the 400 leg of The Woodlands proved to be too powerful, overtaking Nederland and glided into first place with a 49 second split. Going into the final leg, The Woodlands had the lead and a fresh Brian Sullivan on the anchor. Sullivan expanded The Woodlands lead to 5 meter over Klein and 20 meters over Nederland. However, Jeff Cutrer, running on the anchor for Nederland, was not about to give up, and proceeded to make up the gap by surging on the third lap, trying to put him and his team in a good position going into the final lap. Nevertheless, a fresh and resurged Sullivan proved to be too much for both Klein and Nederland and he proceeded to run his final 400 in 60 seconds, capturing the victory as well as breaking the Texas Relays record by 5 seconds. Cutrer managed to run 4:18 on his split but it was not enough