UP’s Waterman earns AAU All-American status in 800m
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NEGAUNEE -- Senior-to-be Keira Waterman of Negaunee High School traveled to Iowa to make her mark on the AAU scene in girls’ track and field recently.
Last week, she took part in the AAU National Championships and Junior Olympic Games held at Drake Stadium on the campus of Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.
Competing in the 800-meter run preliminaries for girls ages 17 and 18 on Aug. 3, she qualified for the finals by clocking 2 minutes, 13.78 seconds, beating out a Negaunee record she set this past spring at the MHSAA Upper Peninsula Finals in Division by exactly six seconds.
She won that race by nearly a second and a half in Kingsford on May 30, clocking 2:19.78.
Meanwhile, her time in Iowa was just slightly better than the MHSAA U.P. D-1 finals record of 2:13.94 set by Lindsey Rudden of Marquette back in 2015.
But Waterman wasn’t done, timing an even better 2:12.79 in the AAU 800 finals last Wednesday. That gave her an eighth-place finish, qualifying her for AAU All-American status.
The race results also give 400-meter split times, showing Waterman’s opening 400 was clocked in 1:02.52, only 11th best before she moved up to her final position in the last 400.
The winning time of 2:06.54 by Vivian Salerno of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, is listed as a national record and also the Junior Olympics record.
Waterman finished less than 3 1/2 seconds behind third-place Paige Evans of Philadelphia.