Track and field: Central passes Stevens at home Track-O-Rama
By Padraic Duffy, Journal staff Tuesday, April 15, 2008
RAPID CITY — The Rapid City Central girls and Campbell County, Wyo., boys captured team titles at a warm and sunny Rapid City Track-O-Rama at O’Harra Stadium on Monday.
“We had a pretty good day,” Central head coach Dave Dolan said. “We got some
points that we wouldn’t normally get when you can put two teams into some of the
relays. But overall, I thought we had some great performances all the way across
the board from sprints to middle distance to distance and jumps and throws. Our
vaulters had a good day too, so it was really a good showing for us all the way
around.”
Central got two wins from Jasmyne King (200- and 400-meter dash)
and one each from Anna Gagliano (100-meter hurdles), Hollie Bloom (pole vault)
and Caitlin Templeton (high jump) to win a close team race.
The Cobbler
girls narrowly outpointed Rapid City Stevens 114-111 in a girls’ competition
that saw three meet records fall at the hands of girls from the Cowboy State.
The Casper Kelly Walsh 1,600-meter relay team knocked down the oldest girls
Track-O-Rama record when their four-member relay team of Shanae Hedlund, Julia
Popish, Jordan Merback and Kate Nyffeler ran the 4-by-400-meter race in 4
minutes, 3.04 seconds, which was their best time of the season. The mark
bettered the old mark of 4:04.30 set by Scottsbluff, Neb., in
1977.
Another meet record that fell was in the girls’ long jump, where
Campbell County junior Emily Moore won the event when she took off on a 19 foot,
5-1/2-inch flight. Moore’s jump bettered the old meet record set by Rapid City
Central’s Alayna Aker in 1992 by more than a foot. Moore topped 19 feet on three
of her jumps, all of which would have earned her the South Dakota state high
school record. Moore also finished
second in the triple jump and 200-meter dash.
Central’s King came in
second to Moore in the long jump, but eased the sting of that loss by topping
Moore in the 200-meter dash and beating Kelly Walsh’s Shanae Hedlund in the
400-meter run.
There were some other standout performances as Merback,
who has committed to run for Stanford next year, won the 300-meter hurdles in
addition to her victory in the triple jump, where her distance of 37-10-1/2
bettered Stevens’ Jamie Keck’s meet record of 37-8-1/4 set in 1998.
Rapid
City Stevens’ Annie Pfeifle captured the 3,200-meter victory in a time of
12:35.85, and the Raiders’ Brooke Garner won the shot put with a heave of
41-2-1/4. Garner and Pfeifle’s teammate, Becca Bedard, captured the 100-meter
dash in a time of 12.80 seconds to beat Merback.
The boys’ team
race wasn’t as close as the girls’ as Campbell County topped the defending South
Dakota Class AA champion Pierre, 129-89.
The Camel boys got wins from
Dillon Coulter (200-meter dash), Dominick Robinson (1,600-meter run), Spencer
Pecha (3,200-meter run), Steve Turpin (pole vault) and Cameron Mock (triple
jump) and their 400-meter relay team to capture the boys’ title.
Unlike
the girls’ side of the meet, no meet records were broken by any boys. But the
Pierre 3,200-meter relay team anchored by Travis Fitzke did fall only
one-hundredth of a second away (8:03.07) from the 1995 Sturgis boys’ record of
8:03.06.
Douglas junior Chandlor Mikkonen uncorked a personal best
156-2 to beat Wyoming’s top thrower, Casper Natrona’s Carson Rowley, in the
discus. The two also finished 1-2 in the shot put, with Rowley winning with a
heave of 54-8-1/4.
“It was a PR by about 30 feet,” Mikkonen said. “I was
only throwing about 130 and I listened to my coach, finally. She (Yolanda Davis)
just told me not to take the first spin so fast and just to stay calm through
the ring and that’s what I did. I beat the kid who beat me in shot, so I was
pretty excited. He’s a heck of a thrower. He’s No. 1 in Wyoming, and it was a
lot of fun to throw with him.”
Rapid City Stevens’ Tyler
Niederwerder also had a nice day, gutting his way through wins in the 400- and
800-meter runs with not much of a rest in between.
“After that 400 I
wasn’t too concerned about my time in the 800, I just wanted to win it,”
Niederwerder said. “I was happy with that. I was pretty tired right after (the
400), but I did my cool-down and got some water in me and was feeling pretty
good. I just wanted to run strategically and use my speed at the end. I didn’t
want to try to push it too hard at the beginning.”
Spearfish senior Kyle
Martens won the high jump by clearing 6 feet, 6 inches, to beat Natrona’s
Patrick Raymond, who also cleared 6-6 but took more tries to do so. The jump was
Martens’ best of the year and he credited the weather and Raymond for helping
him get it.
“It helped out a lot to stay warm and stay loose,” Martens
said of the beautiful weather. “And it helps to have somebody push you like
that. The last few meets the highest was 5-11, so it was really nice to have
that competition.”
Martens sees bigger things on the horizon after
Monday.
“They said I cleared 6-6 by a couple of inches,” Martens said. “I
don’t know, 6-9 or 6-10 might not be out of the question.”
Pierre’s Matt
Tetzlaff won both the 110- and 300-meter hurdles for the Governors, who will be
hosting the Pierre Legion Relays on Friday. All four Class AA programs from the
Hills will be competing in Pierre. Most of the Class A area teams will be in
Custer on Friday for the Custer Invitational.
Story Photo
Rapid City Central's Anna Gagliano sends sand flying as she comes crashing down after leaping 17 feet, 1 inch in the girls long jump finals Monday afternoon during the Rapid City Track-O-Rama at O'Harra Stadium. (Seth A. McConnell/Journal staff)
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