Wahkiakum excels at track & field qualifiers

The Wahkiakum High School track and field team traveled to South Bend last Wednesday, May 14, and came away with a slew of top-four finishes. As the competition was a state qualifier, the top eight, according to Coach Tina Merz, go on to state. For the boys on the track, Jayden Stoddard took second in the Men’s 100M with a time of 11.95 but managed a first-place finish in the 200M with a personal-record time of 24.66. Noah Sandhu took second in both the Men’s 800M and 1600M with times of 2:22.65 and 5:18.02, and Cody Vicars took third in the 800M with a time of 2:33.23. In team competition for the boys, the quartet of Stoddard, Joseph Merz, Robby Chandler, and Dom Diaz took second in the Men’s 4X100M Relay with a personal-record time of 28.49, and Merz, Diaz, Sandhu, and Josiah Garrett took third in the Men’s 4X400M Relay with a personal-record time of 4:10.95. In the field for the boys, Chandler had a personal-record distance of 147 feet in the Men’s Javelin 800g, good enough for fourth in the event, as well as being called “toughest in District 4 in the state” by Coach Merz. Joseph Merz managed a fourth-place finish in the Men’s high Jump with a height of 4 feet, 10 inches to round our top-four finishes for the boys.

On the girls’ side of the track, Clara Hogue took first in the Women’s 100M with a personal-record time of 14.41. Mayleonna Casey took first in the Women’s 800M with a personal-record time of 2:39.61, and Sam Dela Cruz took fourth in the Women’s 300M hurdles with a time of 54.50. In team competition for the girls, Casey, Hogue, Dela Cruz, and Anna Vik took second in the Women’s 4X100M Relay with a personal-record time of 55.71. In the field for the girls, Vik took first in the Women’s Javelin 600g with a distance of 104 feet, 7 inches. Dela Cruz took second in the Women’s Long Jump with a distance of 13 feet, 2.25 inches but took first in the women’s Triple Jump with a season-record distance of 32 feet, 4 inches. The team travels to Tacoma Thursday, May 22, at Franklin Pierce High School for the 1B District 1/2/3/4 championship. The WIAA 1B/2B/1A State Championship Meet takes place Thursday through Saturday, May 29-31 inside Eisenhower High School’s Zaepfel Stadium in Yakima.