I knew it was just a matter of time before he really blossomed like this.”įor Aquinas assistant coach Kevin Winne, he got a firsthand look at what the future of Aquinas track could look like. “I was expecting him to break out his senior year of high school, but like I said, we lost that one year because of COVID. “That didn’t surprise me at all,” Reid said. For Iacona’s former coach at De La Salle, Dominic Reid, it was exactly the transition he expected from Iacona. Iacona also led the 4x400 team to a 3:15:96 time at the national championship meet, breaking a 10-year-old school record as well.įor most, Iacona’s breakout season came as a surprise solely due to the difficult transition from high school to college. I didn’t know the time really, so it was definitely a shock.” “I always looked at it, but the first thing I focused on was hitting a (personal record) and doing better than high school. “I had talked about it with my dad because I tried to get the high school record at De La Salle but never ended up getting it,” Iacona said. While All-American honors are impressive, Iacona’s 47.69 time in the prelims, which was second in the nation, broke a 20-year-old school record in the 400-meter as well. In his first year at Aquinas, Iacona earned All-American honors in the 400-meter at the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Indoor Track and Field Championships at South Dakota State University on March 4, finishing fifth with a time of 47.82 seconds. You never know what the outcome could be.” In college, every meet, you’re running against all fast kids who are pushing you. “In high school, you run against kids in some meets and you’ll be the only fast kid there. “The biggest difference is everyone’s fast,” Iacona said. While everything seemed to be a bit of a culture shock for Iacona as he settled into collegiate competition, the feeling of success was something that seemed to be contagious for the freshman runner. It was the final piece of an unordinary yet successful high school career in which Iacona had lost his sophomore year to COVID-19, but it also opened up a new chapter, as he continued his track career at Aquinas College in Grand Rapids. SHELBY TOWNSHIP - In his senior year at Warren De La Salle Collegiate High School at the 2022 Michigan High School Division 1 State Finals, Shelby Township native Nathan Iacona ended his final high school season with an eighth-place finish in the 400-meter, earning all-state honors.

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