Escalon’s track and field athletes put together a strong showing at the Trans-Valley League finals, hosted May 4 in Hughson.
“The athletes performed well and we walked away with 14 kids advancing to Divisionals,” said head coach Carrie Nash. “Besides these qualifiers we had a lot of kids once again, post personal bests in their events, definitely something to celebrate.”
Divisionals were scheduled to begin Tuesday, May 9 and continue Thursday, May 11 at Weston Ranch.
Escalon qualifiers, some with personal records in their events, were:
Logan Anderson, TVL league champion in the long jump, 20'10.5" (PR)
Owen Nash 2nd High jump 5'11"
Andrew Morales 3rd 400m 54.27 (PR)
Chloe Farley 3rd shot put 30'6"
Boys 4x100m relay 3rd 45.05 (Anderson, Graham, Reider, Nash)
Boys 4x400 relay 3rd 3:42.19 (Morales, Barker, Anderson, Nash)
Girls 4x800m relay 3rd (Wampler, Shaddix, Baker, Gonzalez)
Athletes also had some solid performances and bettered their time or mark in a number of events.
Boys
1600m Nate Millard 4:56.39 (finally broke the 5 minute mark, Nash noted), Jose Calderon 5:02.96
3200m Daniel Bagadiong 11:44.37, Joshua Churchill 12:28
110mHH Ricky Fernandez 20.58, Trenton Epps 21.76
300mHH AJ Cerasi 48.38, Julian Gonzalez 48.63
Shot Put Ben Lora 37' 6.5"
Pole Vault Marcos Grajeda 7'11"
Girls
400m Reagan Baker 1:12.29
1600m Ryan Walker 7:02.86
3200m Charlotte Shaddix 14:42.15
100mHH M. Webster 20.55, Kaitlyn Kjellberg 20.72
300mLH Kaitlyn Kjellberg 59.47
High Jump Sammy Lang 4'7"
Nash added that the athletes – and her assistant coaches – showed determination, flexibility and commitment during a season where training was difficult and some athletes had to travel just to have a place to practice some field events and others had to make due with tough conditions on the EHS campus.
“I’m thankful for the perseverance and grit that they showed throughout the season. Their attitudes were positive and their mindsets were good,” Nash said of her athletes. “My coaching staff was amazing; to say we all got creative would be an understatement. We are all looking forward to a new facility that we can practice and compete well on.”