By Mark Schafer | The News-Review
FORT DODGE – At first everything seemed to be going extremely well.
It turned out that things might have been going a little too well for him, at least in the early portions of the class 1A State cross country meet held Saturday.
“Things started off really, really well for me,” said Sigourney senior Troy Klett, who ran in his second consecutive State cross country race. “My problem was I just went out way, way too fast. I ran a really fast first mile, it is what it is, I’m not quite at that level yet.”
Klett completed the first mile in a little over five minutes. While that was a pace that would help him keep up with the leaders, it proved to be too fast of a pace for the Sigourney senior to maintain.
“I saw my time in the first mile was at 5:09, and I thought, wow that is pretty steep, especially when I shoot for a 5:30 at most course,” Klett said about his first mile time. “I knew it was too fast. It is the State meet, so I was going to leave it all out on the course.”
Throughout the second mile of the course Klett continued to pump his legs as much as he could, but the pace just wasn’t there. He continued as much he could, but some of the faster runners would pass him.
Overall Klett finished the race with a time of 17:30.2 which placed him 47th overall. Not his season best time, but still a time that he is happy with.
“Sometimes you have good days, and sometimes you have bad days on the course,” Klett said. “Today was just a bad day. The last mile, mile and a half I was just hanging on the best I could. It was a fighting effort the entire last mile.”
Although Klett was passed in the final stages of the race, he was able to use his strength, the down hill portion of the course, to power himself to his 47th place finish.
Klett was able to improve on his finish from a season ago.
“I still ran a faster time than what I had last year at the race,” Klett said. “I’m not impressed with my time today, but it is what it is. I had a lot of memories from this season. Winning the South Iowa Cedar League championship is something no one can take away from me, and being able to finish here is a great feeling too.”
