T-R PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE - South Tama junior Barrett Jesina (9) strides out on the homestretch during the second lap of the Class 3A 3,200-meter run on on Thursday at the Iowa Co-Ed State Track and Field Championships inside Drake Stadium in Des Moines.

DES MOINES — The Class 3A boys’ 3,200-meter race made an assault on the recordbooks, so South Tama junior Barrett Jesina was good with where his season finished — because it was on the blue oval.

Jesina finished 19th in the event on Thursday at the Iowa Co-Ed State Track and Field Championships inside Drake Stadium, slipping two spots from his qualifying seed but smiling afterward just the same.

Jesina finished in a time of 10 minutes, 18.24 seconds, unable to chase down the times he’d set out to achieve when he qualified for state.

But considering the way the race went, even Jesina’s personal-record time would only have moved him up three spots in Thursday’s finale.

“It was alright,” he said, analyzing his last run of the season. “I went out fast like I wanted, but then just kinda died a little bit the second mile — a little bit more than I wanted to.”

As the eight-lap race went along, runners slowly began to separate from each other and Jesina, a tall, skinny sort, had trouble breaking through the wind on the backstretch without someone close enough in front of him.

“They did pull me a long, but I didn’t go with them and I should have,” Jesina said. “I just kinda died a bit, but also there were just a lot of good runners.”

Western Dubuque’s Quentin Nauman ran the sixth-fastest time in state meet history to win the 3A title in 8:57.97, and Pella’s Canaan Dunham was second in 9:06.76.

Jesina qualified at 10:09.65, which is eighth all-time at South Tama, and was in pursuit of even more than that.

“The first mile was 4:55, which is a little bit fast for me, but to run a good time you’ve got to get out fast,” he said. “I hit the first mile like I wanted to. My PR was 10:09 and I wanted to try to break that. Sub-10 would have been a fun goal but that seemed a little bit far off.

“I was struggling (after a mile) but I thought hopefully I would be able to keep going. That fifth lap, with 200 to go, I started really feeling it and started to fall off the pace a bit.”

Jesina’s final lap was the fourth-fastest of the eight as he brought the Trojan uniform across the finish line for the last time this season.

“It means a lot,” he said. “It’s a goal I had last year and I just didn’t quite do it. To do it this year, it’s such a great atmosphere. Running in a full stadium, it feels really good.”

South Tama senior Timmothy Chandonia is the team’s final state competitor this week as he hits the shot put pit on Friday at 11:30 a.m. Chandonia, who was a Drake Relays qualifier, is seeded 13th in 3A.