This is the best account of the slightly-better-than-average-high-school-trackster I have ever read. Brings back great memories!

A related story from my track career, where I was good enough to make sectionals but not good enough for state.

My junior year, I ran the 3200 in our conference meet as my third event of the night, so pacing myself would be crucial. The race had a few of the best runners in the state, and I knew that anyone who tried to hang with them in the first lap or two could be easily gobbled up if I conserved my energy. That's exactly what happened. But as a result, the first few laps I was running solo in dead last place, with quite a large gap between me and everyone else -- even though I was nailing my lap pace goal.

I neglected to tell my coach my plan, since she didn't believe in the concept of even pacing. She kept screaming at me to get up with the others. I kept racing my plan.

Fast forward to the second half of the race, and I kept steadily making up ground and reeling people in. Now all the pity claps from teammates (and baseball players who now wandered over to the end of our meet) turned into actual cheers when they saw what I was doing. My coach started giving me positive feedback for "picking up my pace." The whole time I was running the exact same even splits even as it looked like I was accelerating relative to the field.

I didn't finish first, second or even in the top 5, but it was one of my best races, like yours. One of the best mantras I ever learned that applies to all of life:

Plan your race. Race your plan.