{"id":372426,"date":"2022-07-15T06:04:06","date_gmt":"2022-07-14T20:04:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=372426"},"modified":"2022-07-15T06:04:06","modified_gmt":"2022-07-14T20:04:06","slug":"run-saipan-excited-for-trip-to-eugene-oregon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/run-saipan-excited-for-trip-to-eugene-oregon\/","title":{"rendered":"Run Saipan excited for trip to Eugene, Oregon"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a>
Dela Cruz<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While Zarinae Sapong gets to line up against the best sprinters in the world in the 100m dash, Team NMI Run Saipan gets to play tourists during the 2022 World Athletics Championships set from July 15 to 24 in Eugene, Oregon.<\/p>\n

Led by Run Saipan president Edward Dela Cruz Jr., Team NMI Run Saipan literally got the luck of the draw when they were selected to represent the Oceania region in WCH Oregon22.<\/p>\n

The rest of the team is made up of Run Saipan vice president Jenna Kong and club regulars\u00a0 Simon Necesito, Jalen Lucido, Sildrey Veloria, and Gerald Galang.
\n

\"Run\"<\/a>
Sapong<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t have any expectations. I\u2019m still in disbelief that we get to go out and experience something like this as tourists. Officially we are going over as \u2018Asics World Ekiden Ambassadors\u2019 along with a team from Indonesia, Mexico, Japan, and Italy. The surprise part of the trip is the Uplift Oregon 5K. It\u2019s the first ever mass participation race to go hand in hand at the same time as the marathon competition,\u201d said Dela Cruz.<\/p>\n

The Commonwealth Ports Authority\u2019s Aircraft Rescue and Fire Fighting staff said the marathon course is designed to do two loops. Then in the last 5K from the finish line, Team NMI Run Saipan and the other four teams will be let loose to race their hearts out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very excited for Sildrey since it\u2019ll be his first off-island race especially on the biggest stage which is the World Championship. They are using this as the test for the Paris marathon which will take place at the same time as the Olympic marathon. I\u2019m very ecstatic Run Saipan gets to be part of world athletics history as the first participants in a mass race during the World Championship stage,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Dela Cruz admitted though that one downer is Team Run Saipan will be missing Galang as the U.S. Army and Gold\u2019s Gym Saipan trainer has prior commitments and he can\u2019t be subbed out.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s non-transferrable. I think the Mexico team only has one person that\u2019s able to make it the last time I checked the roster.\u00a0 I\u2019m really sad Gerald won\u2019t be able to join us. This goes to show when I make a relay team people shouldn\u2019t hesitate to join it. This team could\u2019ve been a very different team if other people responded quicker and said \u2018yes\u2019 to joining,\u201d said Dela Cruz.<\/p>\n

Sapong, meanwhile, will be competing in her third World Athletics Championships following stints in London in 2017 and Doha in 2019.<\/p>\n

Her coach, Northern Marianas Athletics developmental coach Elias Rangamar, said their goal is to have the 2021 NMSA Female Athlete of the Year improve her times in the glamor event of the World Champs.<\/p>\n

\u201cZari hopes to get a personal best and break the elusive 13-second 100m that she wanted to break before the pandemic happened. She came very close during the Mini Games,\u201d he said while transiting in Guam.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While Zarinae Sapong gets to line up against the best sprinters in the world in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":372422,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-372426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=372426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/372422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=372426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=372426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=372426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}