Symmonds advances to 800m semis

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Boise's fastest man hopes to bring home another gold medal to the City of Trees - and he's well on his way.

Bishop Kelly graduate Nick Symmonds won his heat during the time trial in Beijing, China. Symmonds won his heat in the preliminary heat of the men's 800 meter sprint with a time of 1:45.01.

The BK track star took one of two qualifying spots in his heat, along with Alfred Yego of Kenya, who finished three-tenths of a second behind Symmonds at the Beijing Bird Nest stadium made famous during the opening ceremonies earlier this month.

The 800 meter distance is two laps of the track, or just less than half a mile. Today's qualifying heat will not be aired by NBC.

Symmonds will join 23 others in the semi-final event set for early Thursday morning mountain time. If he moves on, the final will be Saturday morning - with the even airing on tape-delay during NBC's Saturday night prime-time coverage.

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