News editor
The Marion girls’ track and field team tied for fourth place and the boys finished in fifth place out of 13 teams Friday at Halstead, despite several athletes sitting out to heal.
“We kept some of our athletes out of the meet to try and heal up some nagging injuries, and we look forward to getting them back this week,” coach Grant Thierolf said.
Boys
Kyle Palic led the boys in scoring. He won shot put with a throw of 45 feet, 10 inches, and discus with a personal record of 153-9. He placed fifth in javelin at 147-0. John Nordquist placed second in javelin with a throw of 162-8. Nick Meyer placed third in discus at 139-5 and sixth in shot put, 42-4. Morgan Wheeler placed fifth in shot put, 42-7, and sixth in discus, 135-5.
“Kyle had his best day in the discus,” Thierolf said. “He keeps refining his technique and is getting better at this event. He threw OK in the shot put and javelin and will get better in those events.”
Thierolf said Nordquist is becoming more consistent in javelin and that Meyer and Wheeler are poised to have strong meets in the immediate future.
James Jones placed fourth in triple jump, 41-4, and sixth in long jump, 20-0. Nicholas Stuchlik placed fifth in high jump with a leap of 5-6. Stuchlik also set a personal best in the 300-meter hurdles with a time of 48.53 seconds.
Tyler Neufeld placed third in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:07.6, a new personal best and about four seconds faster than a week earlier.
Girls
Marissa Jacobson again paced the girls, winning the triple jump with a leap of 34-1½ and placing second in long jump, 16-1½, and 400-meter dash, 1:00.47. Jacobson’s time in the 400 was a personal best.
Emily Schneider placed fifth in long jump with a personal best of 15-3. Katey Ehrlich placed fourth in triple jump, 31-7, and fifth in 300-meter hurdles, 50.41.
Alicia Maloney won pole vault at 9-6, and Erika Hess placed fifth at 7-6. Maloney said the key to doing well in pole vault is a good takeoff, which includes a good knee drive to help slingshot up, as well as a good head of steam at takeoff.
“Speed is a major thing,” she said.
Kristen Herzet placed third in discus, 99-8, and threw the javelin a personal best of 96-1.
The 4x100-meter relay team of Schneider, Hess, Ehrlich, and Maloney placed sixth with a time of 52.92.
Tuesday’s home Central Kansas Track League meet was rained out. The team competes Friday in the Beloit Relays.