Tahesia Harrigan-Scott competed in her 4th IAAF World Championships
MOSCOW August 13—Veteran sprinter Tahesia Harrigan-Scott—who has competed in previous IAAF World Championship in 2005, 2007 and 2009—was sixth in her 100m heat on Sunday, during the 14th edition of the championships in Moscow, Russia, that runs through Saturday.
She recorded a non-advancing time of 11.61 seconds. Harrigan-Scott—a 2009 semifinalist—had been besieged by injury since running 11.33 to book her ticket to Moscow. It was her fastest time since the injury after running 11.65 in Sweden, before the championships.
“I felt that I was ready to run faster, at least in the 11.2-11.3 range, but the start was awful and my reaction was poor,” she reflected. “I kind of relaxed in the blocks when he said ‘set’ which caused me to have a delayed reaction and took away the strong side of my race and it went downhill from there.”
Harrigan-Scott came to Europe on a pre camp training to work on the things that had been lacking since the injury, in terms of preparations and race mechanics, while acclimatizing to the 8-hour time difference.
“We noticed that the starts were really good but the end was a bit of a problem, so, on this trip, we were trying to work on the end, but for some strange reason, the start didn’t come at all,” she noted. “The season is over, but practices aren’t over.”
When she ran that 11.33 race early in the season, Harrigan-Scott said it was a great indicator of where she was in her training that had seen her running 23.37 seconds twice—her fastest 200m since 2006 and a personal best of 55.33 in the 400m.
“I was planning on going sub 11 this year, to tell the truth,” the territory’s double sprint record holder said. “My rhythm was finally coming back, my first couple races was seeing what I had to work on and fine tuning different aspects. So, the 11.33 in that meet—considering it was raining and it was cold—I knew I was going to run a great time this year and get a personal best.”
Harrigan-Scott said after she got injured, a lot of the mental aspects came into play.
“It was not as positive as you wanted as you went through the cycle of training really well, training hard, doing everything you are supposed to do, but, something tends to happen,” she recalled. “It’s the nature of track and field, and you always have to bounce back. It’s not always as easy as you want it to be, but next year is another year.”
Karene King—who rounds out the field of athletes—will make her championships debut in the 200m at 02:55 am BVI time, on Thursday morning, Aug 15.
The BVI Athletics Association thanks the BVI Olympic Committee and Tops Photo Studio for their contributions that facilitated the delegation’s participation.