Kosmos keeps breaking records

Jey Sin
Staff Writer
April 29, 2004, Page 8

The Heptathlon is as hard to compete in as it is to pronounce. It consists of the 100 hurdles, high jump, shot put, 200 meter dash, long jump, javelin, and 800 meter run.
Freshman Katie Kosmos was last week’s Athlete of the Week for her outstanding performance in the women’s Heptathlon. She scored a Doane record of 4876 points in the event.
Kosmos has been involved with track since she was 10 years old and has loved it ever since. She grew up in rural Saline County until high school, when she moved to Lincoln and attended Northeast High School.
Kosmos was active in gymnastics early on, but when she was about 10 years old she dislocated her thumb and couldn’t participate in gymnastics anymore.
Since she couldn’t play softball or do gymnastics, Kosmos bugged her mom to find her something to do. Her mom suggested track.
Ever since then Kosmos has been an active track athlete and has been focused on excelling in any event she competed in.
Outside of high school track, Kosmos also ran with the Saline Spartans, a summer track program in Crete. This is where she found her calling for the Heptathlon.
When she started out she competed in the Pentathlon, which consists of five events instead of seven.
Kosmos came to Doane this year as a freshman, and instantly fell in love with the track program. She said that track at Doane has helped her excel more than she was able to anywhere else.
“I love to be active and being in track and competing gives me an uplifting feeling,” Kosmos said.
She recalls the last race for her record breaking Heptathlon and what her coach said to her. He told her that she could break the record if she ran a fast enough time in this race She was stunned.
“I had no idea until that moment that I had a chance to set a new record,” Kosmos said.
To be the best at anything you do, you have to be consistent and consistency seems to be Kosmos’ middle name.
She competed last Friday at Nebraska Wesleyan and broke another record, in the 400- hurdles.
She ran a time of one minute, 2.6 seconds beating the past record of one minute 2.9 seconds.
Kosmos takes all the attention in stride and keeps on competing:
“I just stay focused on what I have to do.”