The IMG Academy girls nearly broke the national indoor record in the high school girls distance medley relay as their victory in a battle against the Saratoga Springs girls of New York at the adidas Indoor Nationals resulted in a US #3 all-time performance of 11:34.86.
Only 32 hundredths of a second separated them from the national record squad of Lake Braddock (VA) at 11:34.54 from 2017. Thru the first three legs, it was a neck and neck race with Saratoga Springs (Kinetic Running). It was not until Tatum David with an astonishing 4:46 1600 meter anchor leg that the race broke open for a decisive win by the IMG girls.
The splits went as followed: 3:34 1200 by Carly McNatt, 58.04 400 by Jais Ward, 2:15.81 800 by Emilia Puskas, and 4:46.53 1600 by David.
The IMG Academy boys made it a clean sweep of the DMR titles at adidas Indoor Nationals as they also had a great anchor leg performance that earned them the title from Cole Piotrowski with his 4:15 anchor leg. They had 3 other teams breathing down their neck with finish times of 10:20 or faster, but the IMG squad improved 7 seconds from their performance earlier this season at the East Coast Invitational in a 10:13.32.
The winning squad consisted of Noah Winters, Carl Hicks, Isaac Carney, and Cole Piotrowski.
Do not expect to see the last of IMG Academy this weekend celebrating national titles either. On Friday, Hannah Douglas in the girls 200 prelims at US #3 23.90 and Ashton Schwartzman in the boys 400 prelims at 48.62 for IMG were the top qualifiers for the championship finals later this weekend in both events.