Houston’s Raevyn Rogers, a graduate of The Kinkaid School, has earned a spot in the Olympic final of the 800 meters.
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The semifinal heats took place Saturday evening in Tokyo (Saturday morning in America). Rogers finished third in her heat, with her time of 1:59.28 good enough to nab a berth in Tuesday’s finals. Fellow American and former Texas A&M star Athing Mu finished with the overall fastest time in the semis at 1:58.07.
The top two finishers in each heat earned automatic spots in the finals, meaning for Rogers, finishing third in her heat meant she had to wait for the results before knowing if it was good enough for a spot in the finals.
For her family in the Houston area, there were some definite nerves.
“My stomach was in knots,” said Raevyn’s mother, Rhonda Rogers-Hunt. “I had to leave the room to be by myself and then I started looking at the statistics myself. And then I saw she made it. So it was a really big relief because I know how hard and how much she wanted it. We all wanted it, but she’s the one doing the work. I just know how much she put into it and I’m just happy for her and happy for all our ‘Raevyn’s Nest’ family that we made it to the next round.”
That next round will take place on Tuesday, a day that also happens to be Hunt’s birthday. Rogers had told KPRC 2′s Christine Noël previously that her dream situation would be to bring home some Olympic hardware for her mom’s birthday. It’s safe to say Rogers’ mom would be pretty happy with that gift.
“I told her, for my birthday, any hardware will do,” Rogers-Hunt said. “First, second, or third - it doesn’t matter. But if she wants to make it a special birthday, a gold would be very good (of course). I’m just happy that she’s there, and she’s in position to come home with some hardware. That’s what I’m very happy about.”