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Momentum is built in the first half of the race. You drive forward and continue to push until you are at your maximum height and speed which you hope to maintain until the end of the race. Momentum is built in the first half of the semester. You establish study habits for yourself and develop a routine that will be able to carry you through the semester. With Thanksgiving break rapidly coming to an end, it is time to start the second half.

Currently, the class that I think about the most is my economics senior seminar. Today I was able to successfully locate the pollution data I needed but unfortunately simultaneously discovered I would have to redownload the airline data I plan on utilizing. It was a two-steps forward, one step back kind of day. Progress is progress. Moving forward I hope to take these two datasets and load them into a program called Stata which will allow me to run a regression on them. At the end of this project, I hope to identify which plane types have the greatest effect on PM2.5 emissions in locations near airports. I feel that this project has required patience but a sense of urgency. I had to have the patience to go to website after website to find the correct information I am looking for while also maintaining the deadlines I must meet for this project. I relate this same patient but urgent feeling to athletics. I have to have the patience to know that I have to stack workout on top of workout in order to improve, while also being aware that I need to take on each workout with a sense of urgency.

Why am I metaphorically combining track and a research project right now, you might be wondering? Well, it is because the first indoor track meet of my senior year is in a week and my research project is heating up. I’m barreling into the second half of the semester with these two things heavily on my mind. I keep imagining myself in the starters blocks at practice. What will I think when the race starts? I tell myself to trust my training and the race will turn out well. In my younger years when the race started, I would focus on who is running next to me and where they were at in the race. This would throw off my own race and limit my success. Patience with a sense of urgency. We all run our own races in life.

With graduation around the corner, it is important to me that I finish the second half strong. Leaning on the practiced habits I’ve developed over the years of school will be vital to this strong finish. I’m running my own race and trusting the training I’ve received.