Philippine team aspirant Victoria Bossong was supposed to be in the finals of two events in the 2024 Ivy League Heptagonal Outdoor Track & Field Championships at the Weaver Stadium in Princeton, Jersey over the weekend.
But the 20-year-old Bossong skipped the championship round of the women’s 200-meter and 400-meter finals, because of her flight to the Philippines for the 2024 ICTSI-Philippine Athletics Championship and the advise of her coach Kebba Tolbert.
“I skipped it. I was not feeling great. It was pretty cold and it was raining,” said Bossong, who is set to compete in the 800-meter run this Saturday.
Bossong, a third year student athlete at Harvard University, was first in her heats in the in the 200-meters, clocking a time of 24.04 seconds, and she had a 55.01 second time in the 400-meters.
The 5’6”Bossong, who is among the 13 Fil-heritage athletes brought here by the FilAm Sports group of Bo Navarro, hopes to be part of the Philippine national team to the Paris Olympics.
She is planning to hit the Olympic entry standard in the women’s 800-meters, after Bossong managed to shave her performance time by almost six seconds since last year.
And Bossong hopes to do it under warm, tropical weather conditions.
“Honestly, it’s pretty cold from where I train. So I’m training under the heat to get my body moving. I’m so excited to compete,” added Bossong, who is close to getting a Philippine passport.
Bossong ran the 800-meter finals of the Pepsi Florida Relays in the last week of March in two minutes and 92/100ths of a seconds for a gold medal, and a clocking which was close to the Olympic entry standard time of 1:59.30.
Olympic ranking points from World Athletics will be at stake during the competition, which attracted more than 1,500 participants from at least nine countries.