Watertown’s Hayley Sutter crawls to qualify for Olympic trials

Hayley Sutter had 30 seconds to cross the finish line if she wanted to qualify for the 2020 Olympic trials. Hurting and fighting to stay conscious, Sutter kept running. 10 seconds left. A few meters away from the finish line, Sutter’s legs buckled. She dropped to the ground. Five seconds left. On her knees, Sutter crawled the last few meters across the finish line.

There are two ways to time a race. Gun time tracks how long it takes a runner to complete the course from when the initial pistol is shot. This method does not consider whether a runner began the race at the start line. Chip time uses radio-frequency identification tags to measure how long it takes a runner to complete the course. RFID mats are placed at the courses’s start and finish line. A runner’s time begins at the moment they cross the mat at the start line and ends when they cross the mat at the finish line. USA Track and Field use gun times to determine who qualifies for the Olympic trials.

There are time variations between the two methods. The difference is less significant in a smaller race but, in a larger, more crowded race, the variances are noticeable. For Sutter, this difference determined whether or not she would qualify for the 2020 Olympic Trials.

Read the full feature here: https://www.wickedlocal.com/news/20190523/watertowns-hayley-sutter-crawls-to-qualify-for-olympic-trials