Two athletes headed to the VA Showcase this year have a chance at making history beyond our imagination. Those two athletes are Kayla Davis and Justin Robinson. Both are doubling the 300 and 500 meter dashes.
There are three things each of them is trying to achieve and each one brings these races up another level in this already high-stakes meet.
The first each of them is trying to do is obviously win the race.
Robinson will race first in the 300 and will be facing off with Sean Burrell of Louisiana and Ashton Allen of Maryland who each own some very fast times. This race is essentially a national championship final.
Just twenty hours later Robinson will toe the line in the 500m dash, for the first time in his career, where he will again face tough elite competition.
Kayla on the other hand will be racing in the 500m dash on Friday where she is squaring off with Athing Mu and Michaela Rose. Mu is the American record holder at 600m and won the 400 at the VA Showcase a year ago (52.55). Rose is the defending 800m national champion outdoors and was national runner-up in the 400m hurdles.
Davis will follow her 500m run with a 300m sprint on Saturday. In this race the field is just as stacked with Kimberly Harris, Shawnti Jackson, and a few others slated to compete. This is a race where 37.5 just isn't going to cut it.
Winning may be their first goal but it certainly isn't their only goal. The next goal in line is to take down the national records. For Justin that means running faster than 32.64 and 1:01.68. For Kayla it means running faster than 36.82 and 1:10.30. The 500m records are very much in range of being broken but those 300m dash records are no joke. The boys record is also the U20 world record and the girls record is a Sydney McLaughlin record.
The final and most difficult goal for these two is win both events in national record times.
If they were to achieve this they would be the first athletes to ever set two national records in two days according to our research. They would also be on a very short list of athletes to ever hold two national records at the same time, let alone to set them within a 24 hour span.
The VA Showcase has made a name for being the home of national records but what makes it so successful is the athletes who come to actually compete. We can guess and predict a lot but in the end it comes down to the athletes and running the actual race.
