By Ed Piper
LJHS freshman Hannah Aalaei set a furious pace, second only to Liesel Sellerberg of Cathedral Catholic, to take home a medal in the freshman girls 1600-meter race at the UC Track Classic Sat., April 1.
It was no April Fool's, as Aalaei--sporting the vowel-champion last name of the season--broke out with the lead group in the four-lap race on University City High's beautiful facility, redone soon after COVID hit, and showed a comfortable running style she could maintain for the duration of the race.
Hannah's time clocked out to 5:38.72a, not bad for the young runner who just entered La Jolla High six months ago after middle school. The student-athletes had the week off due to Spring Break, so there weren't a lot of numbers (five Viking runners over two days) or a lot of support (no LJHS coaches in attendance, that I could tell) at the end of the vacation week to run in the close-by event.
Seventeen girls finished the race, and eight others did not run, as evidence of the Spring Break timing, under beautiful clear skies after months of heavy rains in the area this winter.
In the 1600-meter Open race hours later, Kevin Chiu of La Jolla, a sophomore, ran a respectable time of 4:48.83a to finish 11th in a field of 36 boys who completed the race.
Isaac McGreevy, a junior, finished 23rd with a time of 5:00.22a.
Teammate Zoe Dunfee ran in the girls sophomore 1600-meter race that immediately followed the two freshman boys and girls races in the late morning Saturday.
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