Nancy Lopez said she enjoyed being on the girls’ track team at Seymour High School her freshman season.

However, due to a heavy class load, she did not compete her sophomore and juniors years so she could concentrate on her grades.

The recent SHS grad decided to join the track team her senior year and said she is glad she made the choice.

She began running track her eighth grade year at a school in Alabama.

“Coming into ninth grade I really did want to do it, and also it gave me my P.E. credit,” she said. “My senior year I just decided to do it on my own because I really liked it.

“It gave me an opportunity to make more new friends. I improved a little but toward the end. It kind of got difficult for family issues so I couldn’t finish out the season, but overall I did love it.”

This season, she ran sprints for the Owls.

“Ever since I was little I liked running,” Lopez said. “I was a sprinter and I did the 100, 200 and the 4×100 relay. The 200 was my favorite. The 100 is short, but you have to sprint really fast. The 200 gave me more time to do something.”

She said during a meet early in the season, a teammate got hurt and was unable to run in the relay so she filled in. After that relay, she was a regular.

“I stayed in it the rest of the season and I really liked it,” Lopez said. “I had done the relay my freshman year and I really did like it because we had to work together.

“It was pretty difficult at first trying to pass the baton to a teammate because she was a little faster than me, but during the meets we always got it. The hand-offs were really important, and we always made sure we got it to the other person.”

She said she enjoyed the home meets.

“I liked it because whenever we would go to other meets those tracks were harder,” Lopez said. “I really liked ours. It was so much easier to run on. Practice was really important. We had to stay committed because if you missed a practice then it was on yourself and it was harder to get back in shape.”

Lopez liked the coaching staff at SHS.

“I enjoyed the coaches and how they pushed us,” she said. “It was hard workouts sometimes, but it was for our own good. We worked together and we were a team and a family-like. I really got in shape.”

Lopez said she felt like she received a good education at SHS.

“I had good classes. I loved the teachers here,” she said.

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Name: Nancy Lopez

High school: Seymour High School

Parents: Arturo Lopez, Cecilia Garcia

Siblings: Lumber, Pricila, Clever

Sports: track and field 2 years

Organizations: choir, pep club, color guard, Global Accent

Plans after high school: work, attend college

Favorite food: Pozole

Favorite singer: Luis Coronel

Favorite TV show: The Notebook

Favorite team: Barcelona

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