After the success of this year’s Cross Country team in the fall, Decatur High School’s Track and Field team was sure to be a force to be reckoned with. Students Gabby Malerba (junior), Billy Carlton (junior) and Anna Blaich (freshman) had already beaten multiple previous school records only a few weeks into this year’s season. 

Malerba has been with the program since she started running with the Cross Country team in sixth grade. Now, six years later, she is focusing on her aspirations to run in college. 

To achieve these ambitious goals, Malerba has had to push her body to extremes. Certain preparations are vital prior to track meets so that she can safely continue her high-intensity performance.

“I always do a solid warmup and stretch with the team,” Malerba explained about her routine. 

Although Malerba commonly experiences nerves before races, she acknowledged that she has people who support her: “My coaches and teammates help build my confidence up pre-race.” 

Constantly pushing her body in training evidently pays off. Malerba recently finished a 3200 (a 2-mile race) with an 11:33 time, beating the previous school record. When she finished the race she wasn’t immediately aware that she had beat the record, but nonetheless was happy with her performance.

“I was more proud of the race itself and the techniques I used instead of the time itself,” Malerba admitted. 

Since Malerba is aware of the talent of her younger teammates, she is confident her record will be beaten in the future.

“Breaking records is not very important to me, especially because there are younger girls who will beat these records by their senior year,” she stated.

Malerba believes that the team’s confidence has increased drastically from the beginning of the season and can attribute that to running on the track consistently instead of roads. She is looking forward to the rest of the season and is confident that the team will continue on its current successful path.

“I definitely think more school records will be broken by the end of the season and our team will really put on a show at states,” Malerba stated.