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St. Marys' Syerra Greber runs in the finals of the 400-meter run in the Division II state championships at Welcome Stadium in Dayton on Saturday. Greber finished fifth, a year after placing eighth in the 200.
St. Marys senior Syerra Greber placed fifth in the 400-meter run Saturday as the Divisions I and II state track and field championships came to an end at Welcome Stadium in Dayton.
It marked the fourth trip to state and the second time placing for Greber, who took eighth in the 200 last year.
"I'm really grateful it ended that way," she said in a phone interview Sunday. "It's what I've always wanted to do, podium my last year. I couldn't have really asked for anything better."
Greber made her first appearance at state her freshman year, running with Ella Jacobs, Lydia Will and Lil Ankerman in the 12th-place 4x200 relay. The next year, she qualified in the 200 and ran 13th.
Last year, she ran fifth in preliminaries and turned in almost exactly the same time in the finals, but the rest of the field got faster the second day and she ended up in eighth.
This offseason, she wanted to run indoor track, but had to balance it against her basketball and club volleyball schedules.
In the end, she ran in one indoor meet, running the 60, 200 and 400 at Capital University in January.
"It was hard to fit that in my schedule, but when I did, it had a decent time, and it kind of prepared me for the spring season," she said.
Between indoor and the start of the spring, she focused on keeping her arms closer in to pick up some speed, worked on her angles and shored up her starts out of the blocks.
"Towards the end of the season especially, they've all kind of come together," she said. "I was at my fastest at the end."
Greber ran the 400 once her freshman year and then chose not to run it as a sophomore or junior because it required more stamina than the sprints.
But her coaches encouraged her to take it up again, because she'd run 1:01 her freshman year and they thought she could make it to state.
"It was pretty much all them," she said. "As I ran it more, it was easier, and I did come to enjoy it because I was doing decent at it. I definitely became more comfortable doing it and I enjoyed training for it and competing in it."
Greber ran it in 1:04.16 at Capital University, then turned in a 59.91 at Patrick Henry in mid-April and kept her times below a minute the rest of the way.
At the same time, she continued to shine in the 100 and 200. She swept the sprints in that Patrick Henry meet, won the 100, 200 and long jump when St. Marys hosted the Roughrider Express, and took second in the shorter sprints at the Western Buckeye League meet before advancing to the finals at regionals in all three races.
Once there, she posted state-qualifying times in the 100 and 400 but didn't run the 200 on account of fatigue. By the end of the year, though, the 100 and 400 had become her preferred events anyway.
"Later on, I really loved the 100 and 400," she said. "Granted, the 400 is a lot more difficult than the 100, so the 100 probably had my heart a little more."
In prelims Friday, Greber ended up fifth in the second heat of the 100 and 13th overall.
"I knew I was on the outside looking in," she said. "My main focus was the 400. But I'm just glad I made it to state in the 100. I've never done it before, and I was just happy to be there."
In the second heat of the 400, Greber couldn't overcome Hathaway Brown's Jane Kennedy but ran second, with the third-fastest time overall, to advance to Saturday's final.
She dropped almost .3 seconds off her time and ran a 56.93 for fifth, while Kennedy won the state title. Bath's Tatum Walsh was .02 seconds behind in sixth.
"Since I did have the third-fastest time in prelims, I wanted to get that third place," she said. "But being in lane 3, it kind of scared me. I went out really fast in the beginning, and my stamina ran low towards the end.
"I was a little bummed out there," she continued, "but I ran my PR. That's all I could ask for."
Greber is going to the University of Cincinnati to major in nuclear medicine. She said she's looking into walking on the track team there and has reached out to the coaches to discuss it.
Celina's Kaden Murlin winds up to throw the discus in Division I, where he placed 15th.
Celina's Kaden Murlin, competing for the second straight year in Division I after placing ninth in shot put last year, finished 15th in discus on Saturday. He reached 150 feet, 10 inches on his second throw, but fouled on his third and didn't advance to finals.
After placing fifth in the girls 4x800 relay on Friday, Ottawa-Glandorf ran sixth in the 4x200 and 4x100 and seventh in the 4x400 as the Titans tied for 15th in the team standings. Anna Buddelmeyer also gave them two points, running seventh in the 1,600.
On the boys side, O-G followed a sixth-place finish in the 4x800 with a fifth-place run by Ty Rosengarten in the 1,600. Bath's Ethan Cole was seventh in the 300 hurdles and Shawnee's Akyus Richardson was fifth in the Division I shot put.
Woodridge won the Division II girls championship by two points over Gilmour Academy and Huron beat Glenville by four for the boys title. In Division I, Wayne's girls won 46-42 over Mason, while the Warrior boys placed second behind Huron.
