As of this writing, I still have not seen results from two important meets of the last week—the Runners Roost of Fort Collins and the Chandler Rotary. Schedules being what they are, I’m going to do a summary here of the meets we do have results for and leave the two missing meets for a later article.

FEATURE PHOTO BY ALAN VERSAW

I apologize for the delay and trust you’ll understand I’m making every possible effort to get back to you with timely reporting on all meets. Meet directors, you’re invited to send results directly to me. Most of you have my email address, but you can get it from Kevin Shaffer (see bottom of this page) if you don’t have it at the ready.

It’s also getting to be the time of the season where I’ll start taking the dive into analyzing the various classifications and genders with an eye toward state possibilities. You won’t want to miss the first edition of that when it comes out later this week.

With that, I’m done with prologue. Let’s jump into what happened at last week’s meets.

Denver South Ravens Invitational

For those who were wondering if Lutheran High School track and field had disbanded, you got your answer at this meet. And the answer is an emphatic no. The Lions are back in town. At least the boys are.

Joe and Trey Ciccio went 1-4 in the 100, Joe at 10.88 and Trey at 11.28. Those efforts weren’t quite wind legal, but they should serve notice that Lutheran means to contest the sprints this spring. That’s especially important news if you run track and field in 3A for Holy Family High School. Joe went on to run second in the 200 at 22.94 (wind-legal), while Trey won the 110 hurdles in 15-flat (not wind legal). Guessing here, a 43.83 4×100 likely featured a Ciccio element or two as well.

Lutheran also enjoyed a field day at the rings. Bode Blohm won the discus at 128-1 and Keaton Reiman the shot at 45-2.

Some other boys’ highlights from the meet included a whopping 24-6 (-1.9) long jump from Brandon Hills of Vista Ridge. We got another massive long jump later in the weekend, but Hills figures as your presumptive state favorite at this point. Hills also won the 200 in 22.37.

Denver North’s KJ McInnis won the high jump at 6-2. I don’t know that I’ve ever mentioned Denver North and high jump in the same sentence before. New blood in an event is always good news.

Jack Lee of SkyView Academy made some 3A noise in the 800 with a 2:02 effort. It won’t be long before we have 3A water over the 2-flat dam in that event.

Among the girls, I’m still trying to wrap my head around the idea that Courtney Wilborn won the 100 from the third of 11 heats. And she won it in 12.19. As it turns out, though, running in the third heat did get Wilborn a legal +1.9 wind, a situation that wasn’t so kind to several other heats, including the top heat. Wilborn’s unseeded strategy almost worked in the 100 hurdles as well. She got second in 15.68, but a +2.6 wind was too big to count.

Leah Hill, running under Denver East colors, won the 800 in 2:23. Rosie Mucharsky, also repping Denver East, won the 1600 in 5:21. Niwot’s Lex Bullen ran away from the 3200 field in 11:39.

Skylar Hawk won the 300 hurdles, something she has some experience with, in 47.16. Eaglecrest was impressive winning the 4×100 and SMR8, the latter in a hair over 1:48. Jayda Glasswright of TJ won the discus in 116-10, while Blythe Cayko of Eaglecrest took shot put honors at 34-8.

Max Marr

Let’s get straight to the mark of the meet. That lands squarely on the shoulders of Tucker Peterson of Roosevelt. A wind-legal 46-3.5 in the triple jump will earn you some notice. Roosevelt’s coming loaded in the horizontal jumps!

Coaching the horizontal jumps at RHS are Colby Schultz and Daniel Joiner. They’re doing a bang-up job of it, too. Schultz has some history of previous success with the horizontal jumps, if you can remember as far back as Cheyenne Hall and Courtney Mills. Try hard, they were worth remembering.

Loveland’s Tyson Williams delivered the goods in a hurry, winning the 100 in 10.89 (wind-legal) and the 400 in 49.33. Skyline’s Andrew Muncy ran a 49.60 400 that would have been good enough for the win at a lot of meets, but not this one.

Bennett Feldenkirchen won both hurdle events but he’s stuck at a plateau point. Sooner or later, we’ll see a breakthrough, but a couple of guys went seriously by him in the 300 hurdles this weekend. More on that in a moment.

Leon Ramirez of Greeley Central pitched a 136-3 to win the discus.

Aside from Peterson’s triple jump, however, what struck me most about the boys’ results was that two different freshmen won the high jump and long jump. Pardon me, but when does that ever happen? Well, it happened Friday in Berthoud. TV’s Christian Chase won the HJ at 6-1, while Berthoud’s own Jayden Nohr won the long jump at 21-10.75 (wind-legal). You know, for an enterprising soul with a lot of patience, it’s worth digging through old results to see if that’s a Colorado freshman record in the LJ. Under ordinary circumstances, I might have the patience to do that, but I definitely don’t have the time right now. It may remain a mystery for a while.

It was an ever-so-slightly shorter list of highlights on the girls’ side at Max Marr. But, we did get Avry Kennison of TV under 60 for the 400. Jaycee Williams and Cadence Lapp staged another showdown, this time in the 1600. Williams won again, which may be getting under Lapp’s skin, this time by a 5:06 to 5:08 margin. Olivia Krueger logged a very nice 11:26 to win the 3200.

At the high jump pit, TV’s Elizabeth Heumann went 5-5 for the win. She got to enjoy a long time with the pit to herself.

Kylee Kielian of Roosevelt went 36-1 to win the triple jump (if the state meet was comprised of the triple jump, we could all go home right now and hand the trophy to Roosevelt). At the rings, Loveland’s Kajsa Borman took a pair from Brooke Franke of Riverdale Ridge. And please ignore fractions of inches at the tail end of discus marks.

Warrior Wild West

This one spanned two days at Stocker Stadium. Notably, they ran the pole vault at this meet. I’m not sure if they’re doing that inside the stadium yet or not, but progress is being made on that front. And a lot of Western Slope folks are happy about that. Maybe happiest of all about that right now is Durango’s Halle Moore. She won the girls’ pole vault at 10-4. Not to rub anything in, but that would have easily won the boys’ pole vault as well.

Central’s Justin Blanton continues the search for sprint peers on the Western Slope, but, thus far, he hasn’t found one. Of note, Blanton scratched the 200 and 400 finals. We’re going to hope that wasn’t for anything serious and that he’ll be back shortly

In Blanton’s absence, Ouray’s Paton Edwards won the 400 in 51.01. Mark Edwards down as the early 2A favorite in that event. Then stay tuned!

You know, 4A is a tough classification to run the 1600 in, but Central got a noteworthy 1-2-3-4 finish in the 1600, all under 4:40. Doers of the deed were Shalom Trowbridge, Jackson Edwards, Tyler Stogsdill and Billy Adams. It was mostly the same crew running an 8:24 4×800. And, for good measure, Alex Fisher stepped in for Billy Adams and CGJ had four at 9:53 or better in the 3200. Do you get the feeling that the Warriors were trying to leave a mark? Me too.

Logan Hafey of Moffat County used prelims to log the first sub-40 300 hurdles of the season at 39.87. It didn’t stand at the statewide best for long, but it was there for a while.

Objects were flying at the rings. I could make this into a rather lengthy list of highlights, but we’ll content ourselves with noting Daniel Baroumbaye went 150 in the discus, followed by William Knight at 147-10. Chief among the highlights at the shot put were Knight at 49-6.5 and Trevor Hill of Montrose at 45-0.5. Stand back, folks.

Gabrielle Horton of Palisade won the 100, 200, and 300 hurdles. If that strikes you as a bit of an odd combination of events, it does me as well. Suffice it to say that Horton will have some options when it comes to state events. Picking her performance of the meet for her, I’m going with the 46.50 in the 300 hurdles.

Ellas Johnson (Glenwood) and Unrein (Fruita Monument) had a nice battle in the 1600 that ended up with less than two-tenths of a second between them. It’s nice they had that moment in the sun, because Tristian Spence of CGJ won the 800 in 2:23 and the 3200 in—hold your breath for this—10:52.

Nykole Meshew of Bayfield won the high jump at 5-3. That kind of height puts you in thin company in the 3A ranks. Not alone, just sparse company.

That’s a lot of highlights for one meet. Well done, Western Slopers!

Yuma Early Qualifier

If you were hoping to see all the basketball players from Yuma and Wray at this meet, well, you probably left a little disappointed. We’ll retain hope that some key names show up before the season is over, but there were still several worthwhile highlights of the meet to talk about.

Kyle Fryrear of Haxtun won the 100 and 200. Haxtun being 1A, that immediately puts Mr. Fryrear on the 1A radar screen.

Yuma’s own Beau Tate took a sweep of the 110 and 300 hurdles in 17.01 (wind-legal) and 43.54. That won’t leave him at the top of the pile, but it will put him into the conversation.

Westen Filter of Weldon Valley won the high jump at 6-2. That becomes a 1A conversation with some urgency in a hurry. Jaxon Yungwith of Yuma took the TJ at 40-10. There aren’t a lot of folks in 2A right now who are challenging that mark.

You always look for nice pole vault results coming out of meets in the northeast corner of the state. Things weren’t overly impressive this time around, but an 11-9 for Nash Richardson of Yuma and 11-3 for Ivan Losa of Akron remind us that bigger things are on the way.

Bryant Schoenthal of Wray went huge with a discus throw of 162-5 and a shot put of 53-5.5. I’m not sure if this means he’s not high jumping this year, but he hardly needs to with throws marks like that. But, Wray being Wray, and Wray having no small tradition to uphold in track, Schoenthal probably does more than just the throws this spring.

Emily Fowler of Sedgwick County swept the hurdle events in 17.63 and 50.61. She might be able to go to state in 2A with those marks as they stand, but she will assuredly trim them down.

Merino turned in a 4:26 4×400. That’s throwing down a big-time challenge for the rest of 1A. Clearly, the Rams set that one up to knock it out of the park. And they succeeded.

Alivia Weathers, the multi state-event winner from Lone Star last spring, opened her season with a 33-10.75 in the triple jump and an 8-3 in the pole vault. The pole vault effort wasn’t, however, a winner, as Sydney Cheek of Wray went 9-8.

And, speaking of Wray, Chloe Cure swept the throws at 103-9 and 33-3.5. The Wray tradition at the rings marches into a new year without missing a beat.

Lamar Savage Invitational

Alissa Rall of Canon City went all the way out to Lamar to run the 800. She very nearly regretted it, as Kaitlyn Pearson of Swallows Charter pushed her all the way to the finish line. Wait, what? Kaitlyn Pearson is now running the 800? Is nothing sacred? Evidently not. Pearson has a good start on it; she might as well qualify for state in every event.

Cecilia Richardson of Simla won the 3200 in 13:06. Offhand, I’d say that time is likely to advance her to state in 1A. She’s been there before.

You may recall Shaylee Scherer of Cheyenne Wells as one who might have won the 1A 300 hurdles at state last summer but she took a spill on the second or third hurdle. Well, she’s back. And she might be a little perturbed at what happened last year. Anyhow, she opened with a 49.89. It’s looking like a great 1A showdown in the 300 hurdles come May 21.

The girls’ jumps out at Lamar were the Jaysa Even show. Even competes for Banning Lewis, and she won the high jump at 5-1, the long jump at 16-8, and the triple jump at 34-10. As a day’s work goes, that one is head-and-shoulders above most.

Alexandria Tice is a coach’s daughter. As such, she probably comes in for a little extra coaching—whether she wants it or not. Evidently, all that coaching is paying off. Tice threw 124-9 to win the discus and 40-10.25 to win the shot put. That was the first in-state 40-footer of the season, folks. Teammate Lauren Reyes went 35-11.75. You’ve heard me talk about Lamar throws before. There’s a reason.

You would be remiss, however, not to notice a couple of nice Cheraw (1A) marks in the throws as well.

Moving over to the boys, Luguse Nuss of Florence is attracting some notice. Two weeks ago, it was a 21-7 long jump. This week, it was a pair of wins in the 100 and 200, 11.32 and 23.01. There’s some tall sprint timber to fell in 3A, but you always begin somewhere. And this isn’t a bad place for Nuguse to begin.

Jonathan Wiggins of Banning Lewis ran the 800-1600-3200 triple. Branden Davis of Lamar kept him from the sweep by winning the 1600, but Wiggins did manage to record a sub-10 for the 3200. Lamar is inside the state boundaries. It counts.

Crowley County’s Rashaun McNeil won the 110s at just under 16 seconds, but Nate Early’s 41.09 in the 300s was just a shade too quick for the Charger hurdler. McNeil also won the triple jump at 42-0.5.

Under the general heading of where-did-that-come-from, Limon’s Gabe Schubarth won the long jump at 22-6. It’s all in a day’s work for a Badger, but it’s better than the school record at a whole lot of Colorado high schools. I’d mention that Mr. Schubarth is a pretty good football player, too, except that seemingly everyone at Limon is a pretty good football player.

And, ladies and gentlemen, meet John Hainer. Mr. Hainer is a junior at Granada high school (the second ‘a’ is a long ‘a’—try not to pronounce it like you might be fluent in Spanish). Mr. Hainer also skyrocketed to the top of the 1A shot put rankings with a winning throw of 45-10.

Broomfield Shootout

And a Shootout it was. Yes indeedy.

Let me say this before you go any further down the page, however. If you’ve already looked at the results and sucked all the air out of the room with a prolonged gasp, the Sheridan High School at this meet was not the Sheridan High School of Colorado but the Sheridan High School of Wyoming. It’s still breathtaking to imagine a team that good coming down from northern Wyoming at the end of March, but Sheridan evidently is that good. The whole world of Colorado 3A has not been suddenly turned on its head. That said, we’ll (mostly) skip over Sheridan High School for the rest of this article.

Four guys under 11 seconds in the 100. It started with Holy Family’s Grayson Arnold at 10.77. Close behind were Simeon Whitaker of Air Academy, CKC of Jefferson Academy, and Sam Beckham of Rock Canyon. Arnold ahead of Kelly-Cannon by .14 is kind of an important story for 3A.

CKC would go on to edge Whitaker in the 200, both under 22 seconds. Luke Dry of Highlands Ranch kept his season record under 50 seconds to win the 400. Arnold, by the way, finished second in 50.46.

Zane Bergen got his CHSAA season underway with a 1:55 800. There were four more guys under two minutes but none close enough to breathe any hot air on his back.

Jackson Shorten finally ran an individual event this spring and opened with a 9:21 in the 3200. Eh, that’s a pretty good opener. Five other guys ran under 9:40. Call it a loaded field.

Carsen Bruns came back to hurdling within the borders of Colorado and settled a few issues very quickly. A 14.52 in the 110s and a 38.98 in the 300s will see to that. Malique Singleton was left bouncing in the turbulence. And Singleton is a solid hurdler.

Grandview was extremely quick in the 4×100 and 4×200. They’ve done that before this season, so this may have been at least partly for effect. The Classical Academy ripped off a nice 1:31.71 to fire a shot over the 3A bow in the 4×200.

Grant Haskins of ThunderRidge swept the horizontal jumps. It’s a shame to lay down a comparison on two marks as fine as his, but I have to say that 24-1 is better than 44-3.5. Unfortunately, though, the 24-1 wasn’t wind legal. I haven’t seen the whole series yet, but I’d like to.

Jackson Wray (Legend) and Lucas Couron (Riverdale Ridge) both went 15-6 in the pole vault. Wray takes the win. I already recognize Wray’s name. Clearly, I’m going to have to get up to speed on my recognition of Couron’s name.

I haven’t really exhausted the highlights on the boys’ side yet, but we need to save some room for the girls.

Julia Pattison did what Julia Pattison does, 12.18 in the 100, 24.78 (NWI) in the 200, and 56.89 in the 400. But, wait! Pattison didn’t win the 400. You’ll never guess what school did, either. Addie Pendergast of Sheridan (WY) won the 400 in 56.18. Pattison can be thankful she won’t have to take on Pendergast at state. Wow.

Kinsey Christianson of Cherry Creek clocked a 2:13 in the 800. I’m not sure where Riley Stewart is right now, but maybe Cherry Creek doesn’t need her. Oh wait, Riley Stewart was running the 3200—in 10:20. Last I checked, Broomfield was still at altitude. Oof.

Maelynn Higgins won one for the home team, taking the 1600 in 5:06. It was a good day to be running the 1600.

Hurdles? Well, you’ve probably already heard of Fabiola Belibi. You’re about to hear about her again. She went 14.63 and 45.35 for the wins. Of note, however, Regan Thorne of Pine Creek went 14.68 in the 100s. Maybe the 5A state title isn’t such a done deal, after all.

Grandview was blazing in the 4×200, as was Cherry Creek in the SMR8. We could speculate who was running the 400 leg of Cherry Creek’s SMR8, but—truth be told—there is more than one possibility. Riley Stewart is not the only Bruin who can turn a quick 400.

Sierra Haberman would have won the high jump at 5-4, but a girl from Sheridan got in the way of that. Haberman lost the tie-breaker. Haberman hasn’t lost many of those.

Cherokee Trail got (more) horizontal jumps wins from Sky Thompson and Kaeli Powe. That’s one of the earlier broken records of the season. I would have had to have buried that reference, except that vinyl is coming back into vogue and scratched records are sure to be a thing again.

Anna Willis of TCA upped the season pole vault standard to 13-0. There’s a potential record in view there, and it could get personal for Willis.

Augustine Hancock of Battle Mountain won the discus at 127-11.

Exhale. It was a pretty impressive meet, was it not?

Guess what, folks. I’ve run out of bandwidth to write the week-in-review article. A deadline looms. I’ll pick up the North Fork and Grizzly Invitationals with the Runners Roost and Chandler Rotary. That will come later this week. Maybe in another 24 hours or so. I hope you enjoyed this little tour of the past weekend’s results as much as I did.