Track and Field Time for the Hetzels

The Hetzel family of Libertyville spent their weekend at track and field events — and Wimbledon — in London. They saw some of their favorites, including Usain Bolt and the Williams sisters.

Today, Charles Hetzel, along with his children Wills and Cecily create blog posts to share. Enjoy!

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From Wills: "August 4: Today at track and field (Athletics) we got to sit in the 1st row. We saw the men’s 100 meter round 1 and preliminaries, Women’s Heptathlon, (which is long jump, javelin throw, and 800 meter) we also saw Women’s Pole Vault, men’s 400 round 1, women’s steeple chase 3000 meter round 1 (Long race about 9 minutes, the race is around the track about 7 1/2 times and you jump over about 3 feet hurdles that are 3 lanes long there are 3 of those and 1 4 foot hurdle With water in it that you jump over!) then we saw the men’s 400 meter hurdles semifinals, the last three things we saw were women’s final discus throw Women’s 100 meter semifinals and finals and men’s long jump. That is for two sessions of track and field that I loved! I had such a great time today! I loved seeing the USA dominating in everything and Great Britain’s amazing athlete: Jessica Ennis, who did the Women’s Heptathlon which is 7 events counting: 100 meter hurdles, high jump, shot put, 200m run, long jump, javelin, and 800m run! All in all I had an amazing day at the Olympic park in London!"

From Cecily: "I had tea, scones, finger sandwiches, and pastries at the formal brown’s hotel. (I’m glad they did not yell at me for not putting my pinky up.) On August 3 I went to track & field; my favorite was high jump and the men’s steeple chase. In one of the steeple chases an Ethiopian runner got hurt on a steeple but kept on running. He broke something in his leg the first lap. I think it was very brave of him to run the rest of the 6 or 7 laps. He did not finish and fell but it was brave of him because he was hurt and he still ran 3,000 meters."

From Wills: Today at Wimbledon I got to see the Williams sisters in doubles against 2 Czech republic women, the Williams sisters easily beat the two czech girls. I also saw Roger Federer against Andy Murray. Murray won his match and Roger wasn’t having a good day! My dad and I left early from Wimbledon to see track and field. We got to see Usain Bolt get an Olympic record with a stunning 9.63 seconds! After that, Usain Bolt came around with the Jamaican flag and I patted Usain on the back, while he kissed and hugged the Jamaicans! I had so much fun at athletics seeing a once in a life time experience of Usain Bolt beating the Olympic record! My highlight of the day was patting the fastest man who ever lived on the back!

From Charles: Super Saturday at The Olympics

"It was another exciting day here in London. Today is referred to as Super Saturday as there were 25 events where medals were won today. The most out of any day during the entire Games. Our tickets for today were a double session of Track and Field with events from 10am to 10pm with a brief intermission with time to explore Olympic Park.

While the weather has been super by London standards, we had just enough rain mid afternoon that we had to bring out the ponchos and umbrellas. Lucky for the athletes and fans the sun came back out. This luck extended for the “Team GB” as the British refer to themselves as. They are really bringing home the Gold Medals today. We saw four track and field events alone here were they medaled. The highlight included seeing their 26 year old phenom Jessica Ennis a heptathlon win in comeback fashion in te final vent a grueling 800m run. She is wildly popular here in London.

Olympic stadium was electric all day and into the night. Two of our seats were right in front of the Men’s long jump final and it was very exciting to see Will Claye of Team USA win a bronze medal and Rutherford the hometown Brit to claim Gold at 8.31 meters. The event was very competitive. The adrenanilin was flowing.

Two of the evening sessions events that really were exciting to watch in person were the men’s 10,000 meters (25 laps). While a Brit named Farah came back to win in the last 2 laps American Garret Rupp won silver. The stadium erupted as all 28 men on the race sprinted all out the last 6 laps. It was a very close race and Rupp made it thrilling.

The concluding evening event under the lights was the women’s 100m final. It was brilliant seeing these 9 women burn up the track with the gold medal going to Jamaican Fraser-Pryce at 10.75 seconds and American Jeter at 10.78 seconds sprinting for Silver.

The evening concluded with many of the athletes touring Olympic Stadium around the track wearing their home country flag thanking the fans.

A truly electric and inspiring evening. Pictures and videos to follow.

Tomorrow we are at Wimbledon for Olympic Tennis and three Gold medal matches including the Williams twins from USA and the Men’s final Federer vs Murray of UK. And we just might make it to the Men’s 100m final! Still trying."

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