A Californian has become the fastest seven-year-old girl in the world for the 3000 meters, her family told the California Post.
Emelie Chavez, from Bakersfield, ran 11 minutes and 43 seconds on Feb. 28 during a publicly open college track meet hosted by Cerritos College, smashing the previous record of 12 minutes and 10 seconds, according to a database of world records for 5-to-19-year-old athletes.
Pictures posted by the Kern Track Club show the youngster beaming after the accomplishment. When she had crossed the finish line, Perez burst into tears, her father, Ramon Chavez, told the Post.
“I was asking her why she’s crying. She’s, like, ‘it hurt so much.’ And she was so happy, and then she just kind of hugged me,” the father, who also founded the track club, said.
Breaking the previous world record was a tough task, Ramon said, but Emelie had the track record to take on the task.
She was a six-and-under-national champion, seven-year-old national champion, and multiple All-American.
Still, he wasn’t sure if it was possible. But Emelie said, “Let’s go do this,” he recalled.
During the record-breaking moment, Ramon was tracking her splits, he said, to see if she would be able to keep pace. She ended up running faster the more laps she ran.
“Just watching, I was just speechless,” he said as she started running faster in the final few laps. “She just took off.”
The previous record was held by Australian Emma Felsman. Prior to that, Anaheim resident Taylor Sojourn in February last year held the record at 12 minutes and 40.36 seconds.
It’s a big turnaround for Emelie, who started running when she was four. Ramon, originally from the San Bernardino area, said he started the track club to create a good environment for his older daughter.
Emelie, as the younger daughter, naturally followed as well. But it did not come easy. Emelie hated running at first.
“We started her running with just like a 400 meters, just a slow jog. And at first she didn’t really like it too much. She was it was tough,” Ramon said.
But the more she ran, the more she grew to enjoy it.
Now, Ramon said they are eyeing the national champion title for 1500 meters this summer and expect to go to the Amateur Athletic Union track nationals out in Iowa.
As for the far future, her biggest goal, she told KGET: To be an Olympian.
Emelie still doesn’t fully understand her accomplishment, her father told the Post. Ultimately, he wants running to be something enjoyable for her as a child, despite some criticism she’s being pushed too far at a young age.
‘I don’t try to pressure her to to run. I don’t try to pressure her for a lot of these things,” he said. “It’s kind of like, she’s just naturally gifted.”
“She’s very shy, just a normal little kid that runs a lot, I guess, compared to other kids her age.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
