Name: Angel Arroyo
School: Dysart High School
Q: What does your training look like right now given the current situation?
A: Even though the Corona Virus is cutting this deep into the season I still have hope it would resume. My workouts given this situation consist of doing long runs by myself and repeats at this park near my house. I need to stay conditioned in hope of at least one more race.
Q: What are you doing to stay busy other than run right now?
A: Being quarantined right now, I stay busy by making comedy videos for my social media and watching Netflix. Also, I have recently started to learn how to play chess. Besides that and training I don't do much, I never really realize how busy track keeps you. Probably because we enjoy it so much time flies by.
Q: What was your most memorable race/moment?
A: My most memorable moment has to be my Junior year XC season. So my team at the time wasn't the best. And at the Doug Conley Invitational, I was running one of my better races where I ran sub 18. I know it's nothing special compared to others but my team at the time was hyping me up for the longest because I was the first from our team to break the 18 barrier. I received all the glory and it just felt so good. I also think on that day is where we all got motivated to break new barriers.
Q: What was the funniest thing that happened during your running career?
A: Junior year of track season at the Chandler invitational I was running the 800m. And so as I'm running it near the 200m mark someone steps on my shoe and it falls off. My head was going all sorts of places, should I stop and put it back on, should I keep going, the track is not soft enough to run with no shoe, too late now just keep going. So I keep going and I can picture myself running unevenly cause my foot and shoe were not evenly plane. As we hit the 500m I can see my shoe just sitting there and for some reason I run by it and I scoop it up. The whole experience was funny to me, picturing how ridiculous I must have looked.
Q: Who would you consider your biggest competition over your four years?
A: My biggest competition over my years of running has to be my teammate Luis Acuna. He was our more consistent first-place finisher for our sophomore year. The next year I was the one putting up a fight for the number one spot and I was winning a couple of races. We competed at everything including races, practices, and even warmups. It made us better, don't think we hate each other we're actually best friends. At the end of the year at the banquet. Coach couldn't decide on an MVP so he gave us both a Co-MVP award and we both just laughed it off.
Q: What was your greatest accomplishment?
A: My greatest accomplishment has to be when I ran my 2:05 pr. It was a tight race all the way and I remember having to go out to the 4th lane in the last 100m and I was passing people one by one which made me feel great.
Q: If you could do it all over again what would you change about your running career in high school?
A: If I was to do it all over again I would have told myself that there might not be a next time so don't psychologically quit during the races. Especially XC races.
Q: What were the most difficult obstacles you had to overcome?
A: The most difficult obstacle I had to overcome was the mental aspects of running. Some days you don't feel like training or some days you have bad races. I had to learn to always stay positive and to stay confident and optimistic when you run.
Q: What will you miss the most?
A: I think I will miss the bond I made with my teammates. After being through so many tough workouts and spending post-meet dinners together and creating memorable moments with one another I'll miss all of them. We've been through so much, we had our ups and downs, and we've all got along so well it feels like we're family.