Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Junior High Girls Win GRC

Worth County's Junior High girls won the GRC Track Meet Thursday and showed that they have a lot of potential to revive the flagging fortunes of the girls' programs after a few down years. The Tigers, who had a series of duels with Gallatin throughout the year, did progressively better against the Bulldogs each time out; this time, they beat them by almost 30 team points. They finished with 116 points to Gallatin's 88. Hamilton, which had dominated the conference in every single sport the last few years, was thought to possibly do so again. But fears that the Hornets would run away with the event like they had so many times in the past did not materialize as their presence actually benefitted Worth County -- they were strong enough to take points away from Gallatin, but they were not strong enough to mount a challenge to Worth County. With the win, the Tigers closed out on a high note as they won all but two of their meets this year. Their two losses were to Class 2 Tarkio, but they got the last word in as they beat the Indians at Rock Port in their third meeting of the year.

It was a day of personal bests for the Ladies in Black starting with the Pole Vault; they placed three people in that event and gave themselves a lead they would not relinquish. Claire Andrews saved her best for last as she got a personal best 8'6" to win the event; she is looking to do even better as she plans to work out extensively at it over the summer. The Tigers seem to have their next big-time pole vaulter as Claire will follow in the footsteps of Jessica Borey, Tiffany Troutwine, and April Miller in that event. Finishing 4th and 5th with jumps of 6 feet were Kristen Andrews and Kaylee Sherer; Sherer had her personal best jump of the afternoon. That showing gave the Tigers 16 points right off the bat.

In the High Jump, Alysa Lyle finished fourth with a jump of 4'2". After the Long Jump, there was a sense that it would be Worth County's day as Katie Mullock jumped a personal best 13'6 1/2" to finish second in the event. Placing second in the Triple Jump was Sydney Thummel with a jump of 27'6". Kaitlyn Davidson had one of her better throws of the year in the Discus with a throw of 69'5.5" to win that event. Davidson also did well in the Shot Put, placing second with a throw of 33 feet.

Worth County used the poles, the short relays, and the hurdles to pull away from the competition and they used a 2-3 showing in the 75 Meter Hurdles to net 14 points. Sydney Thummel was second in the event with a time of 13.69 while Alysa Lyle was third with a time of 13.92. The scary thing about that showing is that both of them are only 7th graders; they figure to provide a solid 1-2 punch in the hurdles at the Junior High level next year.

Katie Mullock took care of her end in the 100, picking up a fourth place finish with a time of 14.78 to net four more points for the Tigers. Then came two of the most exciting races of the afternoon in the 4x200 and 4x100 relays.

In the 4x200, the Tigers were third for the first two legs of the race as Claire Andrews ran the initial leg and Elizabeth Novak ran the next leg. But then Novak and Kaitlyn Davidson engineered a full-speed handoff to put Worth County in front for good and Davidson was able to get the stick to Katie Mullock with Worth County in the lead. Mullock steadily pulled away from the competition and Worth County won easily with a time of 2:02.58. In the 1600, Kaylee Sherer got off to a slow start and was as low as 7th, but she steadily passed runners until she got herself up to fourth with a time of 6:18.21. After that interlude, the Tigers ran the 4x100; they started off in second, but then got a huge burst from Tiffany Davis to put themselves into first to stay. But they had to fend off a spirited challenge from Albany the rest of the way. However, Alysa Lyle and Katie Mullock fended off the challenge and won with a time of 58.22.

Placing third in the 800 was Kristin Andrews with a run of 2:46.54 for the Tigers; she had been a steady source of points in that race all year. Worth County then placed two in the 200 as Sydney Thummel was 3rd and Kaitlyn Davidson 5th. Thummel had a time of 30.11 while Davidson had a time of 30.66. The 4x400 figured to be another duel between Worth County and Gallatin, but it was Maysville who jumped out to a big lead initially. While Worth County finished third, they were witness to the most exciting race of the afternoon as Gallatin constantly chipped away at the big Maysville lead to finally catch them at the final tape by two hundreths of a second. Worth County's time was 4:48.79.

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