TXST TRACK AND FIELD
Junior Melanie Duron’s dominant season continues, qualifying for the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships in the shot put competition just three months after qualifying for the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships in the same event.
Advancing to her first ever outdoor national meet, Duron is excited to compete against the best in the nation.
“It’s a blessing in [and of ] itself,” Duron said. “It just shows all the dedication and the work that I’ve been putting in and my coaches are putting in throughout the season to be able to help me get through this level. Just going to outdoor nationals is the hardest part. So just now that we’re here, we get to have fun, live with it and see what happens.”
Duron’s journey to outdoor nationals has not been an easy one as the graduate of Laredo Martin High School who started the season transitioning from the gliding technique to the spinning technique.
For Head Coach John Frazier, having Duron transition between throwing techniques would allow the junior the ability to hit further marks.
“That was a pretty big move because [Duron] thought that her old glide technique was going to be the best technique, and it’s a good technique,” Frazier said. “But when you look at the highest level [of throwers] and her athleticism, I knew that she could take to the spin. Letting her buy into it was some work. Her [personal record] throw was at the conference meeting.”
The transition between throw techniques was not an easy process for Duron who had to overcome many obstacles.
“It hasn’t been easy,” Duron said. “There’s been times where mid-practice [I] just start breaking down, crying because I’m frustrated. It just takes a lot of patience, sacrifice and a lot of hard work and dedication. Being new to the spin means that you have to work twice as hard, three times harder than everybody else next to you because you’re still trying to learn the new technique.”
But despite her struggles, Duron continued to put trust in the coaching staff even through some of the lowest points of the season, which built her mental confidence up.
“[I continued] being locked in with my coaches and being on the same page and just trusting everything that they tell me,” Duron said. “I went through a patch where I didn’t think I was making the right choice, and I wasn’t going to be successful, [especially since I was] switching two, three months before indoor started. Now that I was able to build, I was able to grow mentally as an athlete, mature, and [I’m] actually understanding the world of the spin.
“I ask God so many times for patience. Just to help me take all the knowledge that I have for the spin, and it just took so much.”
Duron went on to gold in the shot put competition at the Sun Belt Indoor Track and Field Championships and qualified for nationals while also setting a new school record in indoor at 59-9. Later in the season, Duron captured gold once more at the Sun Belt Outdoor Track and Field Championships, throwing a then personal best in outdoor at 56-7.5, before throwing a 57-.25 the next week, the third best mark in school history.
Advancing to regionals, Duron finished ninth, throwing 54-11.5 and securing her spot to nationals.
Though the mark was not what Duron wanted, it was still good enough to send the junior to her first NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championship meet.
“The mark that I threw at regionals wasn’t something that I wanted to throw,” Duron said. “My goal was to obviously make nationals, and thank God that that happened; but my other goal was to get top six, so I would be able to be in the first flight. That didn’t happen, but that’s not going to stop me from making finals.
“It was very nerve-racking because I did place ninth and just being in the bubble at the end kind of just freaked me out a little bit. But I knew I had the ability, and I made nationals with one fair throw because I only had one fair throw. That’s all you really need.”
After qualifying for nationals, the pressure of the season after transitioning throws paid off in the end.
“It was lifted off my shoulders,” Duron said. “It was like a rush of joy because like I’ve mentioned before, I’ve gone through this season and my first year officially transitioning [throws]; and it was proof that hard work really does pay off … [through] dedication and sacrifice [and] just being on queue with your coaches. It was all bittersweet moments.”
Going into nationals, Duron isn’t intimated by the environment at nationals.
“The feeling is I already know what’s going to happen,” Duron said. “I already know the environment, so it’s not going to be nothing. Thank God, I’ve competed against these girls multiple times, so I know it’s to be expected and what I need to work on.
It’s the same thing going from indoor to nationals. It’s the same thing, the same ring, the same ball.
This time we’re just going to execute, get all the nerves out really early, go out there and hopefully win this.
“I have a really good feeling about being the underdog at this moment because I feel like nobody really thought I was going to make it this far. Now that I’m here and I have the opening in the door to go in, I’m gonna be the underdog and [prove] everybody is wrong.”
Full recap of the Texas State track athletes at NCAA Outdoor Track and Field will be published in next Friday’s paper.
cmcwilliams @sanmarcosrecord.com Twitter: @ColtonBMc
Duron was able to over come switching new throwing techniques, which allowed the junior to throw some of her best throws of the season. Photo submitted by Texas State Athletics
