By Gary R. Rasberry
grasberry@dailystandard.com COLDWATER -- While the rain damped the conditions, the competition was solid after the first day of the 2006 Mercer County Knights of Columbus Track and Field Meet at Cavalier Stadium.
The Parkway boys ended Tuesday in a spot where they hope to be after Thursday, in first place with 36 points after solid days in the field event finals.
Marion Local, on the strength of winning the 3,200 relay and the high jump, are in first on the girls' side with 29 points.
For the Panthers, it seemed like All-Fisher, all the time. Panthers thrower Jason Fisher and Parkway jumper Josh Fisher, helped provide 30 of the points on the day for the Black and Gold.
Jason Fisher, tuning up for next week's Midwest Athletic Conference meet at Minster, swept the throwing events, wrapping up his day with a top shot put of 45 feet, 7 1/4 inches and outdistancing the second-place throw by over 20 feet in the discus, coming up with a top effort of 146-10. Josh Fisher added the other win in the competitive long jump field. Josh Fisher dueled with teammate Jacob Fox and St. Henry representatives Pat and Chris Reichert in the event before edging out Fox by 13/4 inches with a top leap of 20-31/4. Fisher also qualified for the finals in 100- and 200-meter dashes on Thursday.
Coldwater, second place after day one with 28 points, got 10 points from Brian Brunswick, who was the only high-jumper to clear six feet on the day, edging out Marion Local's Paul Droesch and St. Henry's Tony Stahl by two inches.
St. Henry and Marion Local are standing in third and fourth place at this point with 26 and 22 points, respectively.
The Flyers' 3,200-meter relay team maintained a dominant season by winning the relay by nearly 10 seconds over perennial distance heavyweight Coldwater.
Fort Recovery stands in fifth with 13 points, but got a big win on the day with Matt Vagedes winning the pole vault with a top effort of 12 feet, a foot higher than second-place finisher Dustin Heitkamp of Marion Local.
In girls competition, three teams are within nine points of each other and all five teams are separated by just 15 points after the field events and relay finals.
Following Marion Local, Coldwater is currently second with 23 points with Fort Recovery in third with 20. Parkway (16) and St. Henry (14) round out the list.
Fort Recovery got its points thanks to Holly Stein. The junior got herself ready for the chance to repeat in both events at the MAC meet with the sweep of the shot put (33-8) and discus (107-7).
Jenny Hartings had the other Flyer win of the day with a 4-10 effort in the high jump, two inches better than the next four finishers. Holly Fortkamp helped out as well with a second-place showing in the long jump.
Parkway freshman Marian Bevington dueled the Flyers' Fortkamp in the long jump and at the end of the day, Bevington's top leap was 16-6, one inch better than Fortkamp's 16-5.
Coldwater did not win an event on Tuesday, but came up with plenty of points with many top-five scoring finishes. Coldwater had top fives in all four contested field events.
St. Henry also did not have a win, but will look to pick up points after solid qualifying performances in the running events. Catie Evers posted top qualifying times in the 100, 200 and 400 runs.
In the junior high meet, run at the same time as the high school, Coldwater is in possession of first in both the boys and girls. The Cavalier girls are in first with 32 points with Marion a distant second with 23 1/3. Coldwater's boys have 50 points after day one with Marion Local, St. Henry and Fort Recovery tied for second with a distant 15 points.
The meet concludes on Thursday. The high school girls pole vault begins at 4 p.m. with the junior high girls pole vault set for 4:45 p.m. The running event finals are scheduled to start at 5 p.m. |
