50 meters to go...he’ll be the State Champion!! The freshman from Marble Falls...9-17, 9-18, and change...the freshman is the champion!!

That was the radio broadcast of Leonel Manzano winning the Class-4A 3,200-meter race in 2001; he was a ninth grader. He would capture five more gold medals on the track and claim three state crowns in cross country before he graduated from Marble Falls High in 2004.

The stakes became higher but Leonel, a young man everyone seems to like, was triumphant in the NCAA 1,500-meter race as a freshman at Texas; he won it again on June 14, and during the weekend of July 3 to 6, in Eugene, Ore., he goes for a berth on the U.S. Olympic team. Wow!

“He doesn’t run that many miles,” Mustangs track coach, Kyle Futril, told me when Leonel was amazing everybody in high school, “but it’s the quality of those workouts; they’re unparalleled. He’s got a great work ethic, because he knows he cannot be successful unless he puts forth the effort.”

He’s trying to pull off the daily double in the state meet! Manzano is at the top of deep stretch in the 1600-meter race...his lead is five meters...He’s going to win it!! 4-16, 4-17....No stars in the sky tonight, but one on the track!

Possibly, the announcer got a bit carried away. Oh, there were stars above Mike Myers Stadium, but the clouds prevented a real good view of them.

Manzano was simply remarkable in his victory in the 1,500-meter race for the national collegiate title several weeks ago. He led wire-to-wire, but it was a short lead over a bunch of talented pursuers.

With maybe a hundred meters to go, Leonel glanced over his shoulder and, if he weren’t so modest and humble, might have said, “See ya.” That’s what he did and the last strides were no contest. The pack was left behind in what turned into a Manzano Masterpiece.

Carlos Perez was another of Leonel’s coaches in his high school days. “He never takes anything for granted,” Perez pointed out, “he realizes he has to bust his backside to win.”

So now the journey has included: victory laps in middle school and high school, a mention in the “Faces in the Crowd” section of Sports Illustrated, and gold medals at all levels.

Leonel Manzano challenges the best Americans in the land at the Trials, and if he finishes in the top three, the next stop is Beijing in August--he will then be an Olympian.