With heavy rains early in the day, followed by heavy rains late in the afternoon, with only a brief few moments of dry skies and conditions, six teams gathered at Great Lakes Cheese Stadium in Burton for the Chagrin Valley Conference Valley Division track meet.
It wasn’t the best day for a track meet.
With heavy rains early in the day, followed by heavy rains late in the afternoon, with only a brief few moments of dry skies and conditions, six teams gathered at Great Lakes Cheese Stadium in Burton for the Chagrin Valley Conference Valley Division track meet.
Under circumstances not conducive to running, jumping or throwing, the athletes nonetheless gave it their best efforts. When all was said and done, the Crestwood Red Devils had won both the boys and girls titles, but narrowly.
Crestwood put up first and third place finishes in the boys 300 meter hurdles to outdistance the Badgers, who tallied 121 points. Next was Kirtland with 111, the Cardinal Huskies scored 96, Wickliffe’s Blue Devils scored 80, and the Grand Valley Mustangs put up 69.
Competition among the girls was tight all the way, with Crestwood nipping the Kirtland Hornets by a 149-148 score. Grand Valley finished in third with 103 points, Cardinal’s Huskies were fourth with 92, the host Badgers tallied 70, and Wickliffe was last with 61.
There was one three-event winner on the day: freshman Livia Martini of Crestwood. She left no doubt as to her efforts by winning the 100 meter dash, the 200 meter dash and the 400 meter dash.
Ainsley Borthwick of Kirtland won both long distance runs with relative ease. The Hornets relay teams won the 4×200, 4×400 and 4×800 relays. Cardinal won the 4×100 race.
Kirtland piled up many points on the girls side by taking lower positions in many races. The Vosicky sisters, junior Sylvia and freshman Lexi, took second and third places in the 400 meter run. Lauren Palagyi won the 100 meter hurdles for Kirtland, and Bryn Bradac was third in the 300 meter hurdles.
Izzy Copeland won the 800.
Chloe Hansen of Kirtland won the discus and placed third in the shot put.
The Cardinal Huskies had good balance, if not depth. Freshman Olivia Krebs won the girls shot put with a put of 35-11. Senior Anna Layman was solid in the pole vault with a second place finish with a vault of 8-0, and the Huskies had many middle-of-the-pack point producers on both days.
The host Badgers also were in a similar spot as Cardinal, with the weather being a big factor in their middle-of-the-pack abilities. Amber Zeiler scored well in several events, and Berkshire efforts were led by a first place tie between junior Kirsten Shaffer and senior Madison Durosko in the high jump. They tied at the 4-8 level.
The Crestwood boys and Berkshire Badgers waged a battle all day long, no matter the conditions. After getting a few events done in warm, dry weather on May 7, May 9 was a different animal. Then, late in the afternoon, as the crowd and athletes alike huddled up to get warmer and dryer, a first- and third-place finish in the boys 300 meter hurdle event put Crestwood into first, and they did not let up.
Berkshire won the 4×100 and 4×200 relays while taking second in the 4×400 and 4×800 events. Senior John Murphy could be found running anchor legs in all of those event, or so it seemed, as the athletes looked more like drowned rats than runners by the end of the day, but Murphy was in the middle of it all.
Miles Miller took second in the pole vault and fourth in the long jump events for the Badgers.
“This weather really was tough today,” he said Thursday afternoon as he headed for dry conditions indoors.
Ethan Bosch, a sophomore for Cardinal, won both short sprints for his team, but for the Huskies overall, lack of depth was a factor. Bosch’s times were 11.57 in the 100 and 24.35 in the 200. He also was fifth in the long jump.
Cardinal junior Max Soltis had a good pair of days throwing the shot and discus. He won both events handily, sending the disc 153 feet, and the iron ball for a 48-11.50 distance.
Junior Troy Champlin took second in the 300 hurdles with a time of 43.95 , and third in the 110 hurdles with a time of 18.77.
The Bable family for Berkshire also did well. Senior Zach took second place in the 400 meter dash with a time of 53.10. Sophomore Sam took sixth in the 100 meter dash with a time of 12.31.
Kirtland’s solid couple of days was focused around several names you see in about every sport, especially football.
Senior Will Sayle won the long jump with a leap of 19-9, and also came in first in the 400 meter dash with a time of 52.72.
Junior Nico Samac took home second- and fourth-place finishes in the hurdle events, along with a third-place finish in the high jump.
Senior Will Beers finished third in both the 100 meter dash and the long jump.
When you factor second place in the 3200 and fourth in the 1600 for Cardinal’s Sam Gdovichin, Berkshire Athletic Director Brian Hiscox got the job done very well for CVC Valley honors, and athletes clearly did their best under very difficult conditions.
