Meet 2 Boy's Wrap-up

Wednesday afternoon at Gate-Chili High School, the Athena Boys Track and Field team continued their winning ways moving to 2-0 on the season against a tough Spartan squad. The first road meet of the season required all Varsity team members to push themselves as Gates-Chili's team strengths lay in many of the events that, in recent years, Athena has been shown to come up short. Fortunately, that is not the case this season.

Thanks to the dedicated training of a number of new members, and veteran trackletes trying new things, there were some surprising points scored that helped to propel Athena to the win. Of course, a number of the steady contributors came to run, jump and throw, too.

A few breakthrough highlights from team members included:

• Sophomore Calvary Rogers' ran a very solid third leg of the meet-sealing 4 x 400m relay. After receiving the baton with a ten meter deficit, he put forth a strong move at the 100 meter mark to pull ahead, eventually giving senior Brian Smith a sizable lead going into the anchor leg. Calvary also won the 400m dash, leading the team to a 1-2 finish. Junior Julio Santos placed second in the same race.
• In a significant field event triumph, junior Nick Marlin won the Shot Put competition. Nick was followed by Senior John Hampton, who was competing in his first meet of the season. These performances represent the first time in many years that Athena has had a 1-2 finish in a throw event.
• Sophomore Ke'on Peterkin placed third in the High Jump. This was the second consecutive meet that Ke'on has placed in the event.

Some key performances from familiar faces included:

• For the second consecutive meet, senior Keith Pease sweeping all three distance events (800, 1600 and 3200 meter runs), and anchoring the winning 4 x 800 meter relay.
• Senior Brian Smith once agin won both the 100 and 200 meters dashes, in addition to anchoring the 4 x 400 meter relay.
• Junior Alex Wiegand won the 400m Intermediate Hurdles and placed second in the 110m Hurdles.
• Juniors Josh Dailey (second in the Long) and Basem Ashkar (third in the triple) both placed in the Jumps.

The win moves the Trojan's divisional record to 2-0 with two more remaining before the season ending "crossover meet." The Trojan Track and Field Junior Varsity squad be competing this Friday, April 19 at East Irondequoit High School. The team's next Varsity competition will be at home with Churchville-Chili at 4:30 p.m.