San Benito High School Naval Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps (NJROTC) Cadets Josiah Alcala, Robert Contreras and Valerie Garza participated in the Fiesta Marathon in Edinburg.
The cadets expressed an interest in running the 26.2 miles as a Mixed Relay Marathon Team, which consisted of Alcala, Contreras and Garza and chaperones, including NJROTC Instructor Jesus Gaytan and San Benito Veterans Memorial Academy English teacher Stacey Gonzalez.
After only a few short weeks of training, the Relay Team finally mustered at the University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley campus in Edinburg for the Race. Despite a cold Sunday morning the cadets and instructors arrived all fired up.
The first leg of the race consisted of 4.25 miles which was completed by Cadet Valerie Garza, next came Chief Jesus Gaytan who ran 6.85 miles, Cadet Robert Contreras ran the third leg of 4.00 miles, the fourth leg of 6.85 miles was run by Cadet Josiah Alcala, and the final leg of 4.25 miles was completed by Stacey Gonzalez. The finish time for the Relay Team was 3:34:05.
Their efforts were rewarded with a finisher’s medal and a second place medallion. Cadet Alcala said, “Despite not training for very long period, we still came in second place out of 15 Mixed Relay Teams, not too bad.” The team was treated to food, drinks and music after the race by the race organizers.
NJROTC Relay Team members, from left, Chief Jesus Gaytan, Stacey Gonzalez and Cadets Josiah Alcala, Valerie Garza and Robert Contreras are shown after their participation at the Fiesta Marathon.