Sofia Abrego pulls off rare distance triple at L.A. City Section track and field finals

Columnist

May 17, 2019 8:44 PM PT

Sofia Abrego, a 14-year-old freshman at Granada Hills High, turned in a historic performance on Friday at the City Section track and field championships at El Camino College.

She completed a unique triple in winning the 800-, 1,600- and 3,200-meter races. Marissa Williams of Palisades pulled off the feat in 2014 and Roman Gomez did the same in the boys’ competition in 1985 for Belmont.

“I feel very tired, overwhelmed and very happy,” she said after winning the 3,200 to complete her triple. “I didn’t know if I could pull it off.”

No one forced Abrego to try the grueling challenge. She could have just picked two races and focused on getting fast times for next week’s state championships in Clovis. But she decided she didn’t want an easy night.

“I said, ‘Let’s do it,’” she said. “The biggest challenge for running in three events is the recovery. The races are obviously hard, but how you spend your recovery time is going to decide your overall ending.”

Her first win came in the 1,600 in 5:04.27. Then she cruised to victory in the 800 in 2:16.84. She finished her triumphant night with victory in the 3,200 in 10:46.11. She intends to drop the 800 next Friday when the state prelims are run at Buchanan High in Clovis.

The fastest sprinter in the City Section is senior Amir Muhammad of Crenshaw. He won the 100 meters in 10.83 seconds to complete quite a comeback. He remembers when he was running for the L.A. Jets as a 5-year-old.

“I was coming in last every race,” he said. “I didn’t have confidence in myself, so I stopped running.”

He resumed running when he got to high school, and now he’s the City champion headed to the state championships. “Just work hard every day,” said Muhammad, who won the 200 in 21.76.

The girls’ 100 went to Kaitlyn Williams of Carson. She ran 12.27 seconds to edge Olivia Adams of University. Both are juniors.

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Christian Rodriguez of Dorsey won the boys’ 800 in 1:54.62. He’s the junior who didn’t run track for his first two years of high school because he attended a charter school with no program. He ran a 55-second first lap to leave the competition far behind.

De Marq Jaque of Granada Hills won the boys’ 400 in 48.60. Ryan Lacefield of Carson took the girls’ 400 in 57.42 and the 200 in 25.55. James Burbank of View Park Prep won the long jump at 22 feet, 7 inches.

Carson ran away with the girls’ team championship. Palisades won the boys’ title by half a point over Granada Hills.

The Southern Section Masters Meet will be held Saturday afternoon at El Camino College. The first running event is at 12:45 p.m.