All of the preparation, pain, grit and sweat come down to one, 12-team showdown to crown a conference champion.

The ISU men’s and women’s track teams have had a full week to recover and prepare for the Big 12 Indoor Championships this weekend in College Station, Texas.

“Those are my favorite weeks; we get to do some work,” said coach Corey Ihmels. “We changed our schedule up a little bit this year — we traveled to New York — and we came off this week being able to get things done and ready to go for the meet this weekend.”

One hot topic on the men’s side was former redshirt football player Teddy Lampkin deciding to leave the football program and focus solely on track.

Lampkin, a native of Omaha, Neb., has come along quite well, Ihmels said. Most recently, Lampkin took first place at the Iowa State Classic in the men’s long jump.

“He’s been a great addition,” Ihmels said. “He comes to practice each day and puts his head down and goes to work. Hopefully [this weekend] he gets a few jumps off right away and feels good. I expect big things out of him.”

The Cyclones have had plenty of time to prepare for the championships. Athletes and coaches alike said the excitement is building in the week leading up to the conference championships.

“We are all excited and looking forward to racing there to show what we have done in our training weeks and that we are in good shape heading into the outdoor season,” said junior distance runner Daniel Gruber.

Heading into the conference competition this weekend, both the men’s and women’s teams will have no easy battles in each of the events.

“On the women’s side, we could score a lot of points,” said assistant coach Travis Hartke. “We could score in that second- or third-[place] range. The depth is a lot deeper on the women’s side.”

All of the coaches agreed that it was extremely helpful that there was an off week to prepare for the Big 12 Championships this weekend.

“We’ve been at it for four weeks in a row, so this last week was a nice chance for the athletes to get back to work and do what we need to do well later in the year, not only indoors but outdoors,” Ihmels said.