Sports
Girls' Track Sets School Record on Way to Relays Championship
The girs' team was won and the young boys' team finish 10th at last weekend's relay meet at Bishop Fenwick.
track coach Steve Sawyer knows his girls squad has all the makings and experience to be a contender in any of the state-level meets.
On Sunday at the Div. 4 State Class Relays at in Peabody, the Generals didn’t disappoint by scoring in all seven morning running events they were entered in en route to a first-place finish.
“The morning was a great start for us,” said Sawyer, whose team garnered 44 of its 57 points in the early session to capture its third straight crown in this meet.
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During the early events the Generals came away with three top finishes, as well as a third, fourth and two fifths.
“Winning is not easy to do at the state level,” Sawyer added. “We’re going to see if we can keep it going.”
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Among the first-place finishes was a school record in the 4x1 mile. The time of 21:49.21 was set by a member of each class: sophomore Meg Blatchford, freshman Emily Horgan, junior Kerry Phelan and senior Alison Lanois.
The other wins came in the distance medley (1,200 meters, 400, 800 and 1,600) with Phelan, senior Hannah Milimet, junior Emily Senning and Lanois finishing in 13:14.35; and the shuttle hurdles with senior Tyler Parady, junior Camilla Worsfold, junior Tess Obenschain and senior Natalie White.
Also scoring in running events was the sprint medley (3rd, 4:26.13, Millimet, Andrea Sargent, Robyn Doroff, Senning); 4x100 meters (4th, 53.25, Parady, Evie Unsworth, Claire Kawski, Bridgett Brown); 4x200 meters (5th, 1:54.1, Sargent, Unsworth, White, Doroff); and 4x800 meters (5th, 10:24.5, Blatchford, Sarah Duffy, Claire Pacione, Horgan).
In the field events, where Sawyer said his team is young and doesn’t have a bunch of depth or experience, the team scored in three events.
The high jump team of Worsfold, Doroff and Kayla Champio finished in second with a combined jump of 16 feet, while the triple jump team of Worsfold, White and Obenscain finished in fourth with 94-9. Maybe the most surprising finish of the day was the javelin triumvirate of Jessa Hattabaugh, Wesley Bynum and Rachel Gershlak who finished in sixth place.
“I expected a lot of the running events to score, and the triple and high jump to score,” said Sawyer, coach of the Generals since 1969. “The javelin was a little surprising. Two out of the three are pretty much new.”
For the boys a 10th place finish, out of 26 teams, was a good showing.
The foursome of seniors Chris Benevento, John Hills and Conor Lyons, and junior Ian MacLean set a new school record in the 4x1 mile when their 2nd place was clocked at 19:04.2. The same group came in first in the 4x800 meters in a time of 8:22.8.
The only other entry to score points was a 6th place in the shuttle hurdles. Ian Thompson, Jack Chapman, Patrick Xu and Tyler Mulley came in at 1:21.15.
“I knew they had capabilities of running that well,” Sawyer said of the new school record holders. “I’ve said in the past that (distance) is the strongest part of our team.
The Generals next travel to at 3:30 p.m.
