Bear of a Meet

Kicking off the 2008 season for Sandy was the 25th Annual Grizzly Bear Open in McMinnville. We were late for the kickoff. As I pondered the start of the season stuck on I-205 Friday traffic, I realized, we should have left earlier. But as unpredictable as the traffic was, the weather was equally unpredictable, and the meet was even more unpredictable. We arrived to the meet in two full, yellow buses. Our bus drivers, God Bless them, managed to drop us off at the gate just in time to watch the first race of the day the girls 4x100m. For a moment I thought to myself, do we have a team in this race? The answer was "no" we decided not to run any girls relays, but wait, were we going to run a boys 4x100m relay? Yes we were, and that meant we needed to get our Bearings and get down to business. The poor freshman and first year track athletes who fell victim to the onslaught of my frustration at our situation handled themselves much better than their head coach in that situation, for that they deserve a ton of credit. I just had to make sure once things got moving that I talk to them all and let them know what they needed to do, and that I was still happy with all of them for still wanting to participate in track and field even though their first meet experience seemed like a nightmare.

On to the actual meet and competition. I was very happy with our boys 4x100m when they managed to get signed in and finally ran. They had very little time for warm-ups and after only one day of hand-off practice, they managed to get the baton around the entire track without dropping it at all, and winning their heat. That got me settled down, definitely, so I could then focus on helping our youngsters as to where they should be, and finally perhaps coaching some technique in the jumps.

The high jump was a blast to watch. We had some youngsters on both the boys and girls side. After looking at the sorry excuse for a pit the girls were jumping in, I decided I had been negative enough for the day and instead looked on the bright side of things, which was not the weather, or the high jump pit, or the meet format, but rather my athletes who were involved in the meet. They were excited now that things had settled down and they new it was their first meet of the outdoor season. Katie Pelchar won a great high jump competition by clearing 5'4" from a six step approach. The girl from Thurston also cleared 5'4" but Katie won on misses. The Thurston coach was some one I knew well, and for awhile we did not see each other. But when I heard his voice, I knew instantly who it was. The coach was KC Gillespie, son of my college coach John Gillespie. I coached KC when he as in the 8th grade. I also like to point out that I had him jumping better in the long jump in the 8th grade than his high school coaches did when he was a senior. It was good to see him. On top of that he tells me John has extra tickets to the trials that he is not using and that I need to contact him if I want them. Sounded good to me. Every dark cloud must have a silver lining I was thinking to myself. Oh yeah... back to the HJ. On the guys side James Myrvold, a very raw inexperienced young sophomore with a lot of talent cleared 5'10" without any misses until 6'0". He tied for first in his very first meet. That was fun to see.

Our throwers got some throws off despite the weather. Courtney Tripp our new transfer from Southerlin uncorked a 104' throw in her first outdoor meet of the season, and followed that up with a 33' throw in the shot. I am sure that she was less than excited about her marks, but as far as the first meet of the season goes, that was not half bad. The glass now was starting to look half full. Blake Bithell managed to get a few decent throws off in the javelin at 147', the shot, 43', and the discus at 122'. Eric Anderson fighting off flu like symptoms managed an effort of 41'11 in the shot and, 103' in the discus. Ashley Moss, our javelin thrower, stayed home with flu like symptoms. I was beginning to envy her a little at the beginning of the meet, but after we got settled down, the meet was turning out to be a lot of fun.

Our Distance crew ran well in the mile lead by Toby Maunu's 4:45. Toby is pulling double duty even though I have been urging him to concentrate on track. But he loves baseball, and what else can I do other than try to support him? Jacob Cuniff ran a 2:04 in the 800m winning his race. He was a little tight at the end, but that is something that we will continue to work on throughout the season. Tressa Hoffman ran a tactically solid 800m race out sprinting her closest opponent in the last 100m of the race finishing in 2:30. Our two young frosh girls Caitlyn Lewis and Hannah Leslie ran 6:08 and 6:18 respectively to go 1,2 in their heats of the mile.

Our sprinters got a solid grade in the meet. Sarah Kathrein wowed the crowd in her 100m race clocking a hand time of 12.6 easily winning her heat and looking very strong and smooth doing so. Her start was great and the rest of her race followed suit. Her teammate Siara Leininger followed Sarah's effort in the 2nd heat of the girls' 100m winning with a hand time of 13.0. To top things off our freshman Taylor Nash won the 3rd heat with a hand time of 13.4. Sarah and Siara's time placed them 1st and 2nd respectively in that event. They went on to do the same in the 200m. Sarah's time of 26.2 was solid but not fantastic, and Siara's time of 27.2 was the same. The boys got the short straw and were awarded the 400m for their first race. Brennon Nelson, coming off a week of no training due to illness, came back strong in his first effort running a 53.6 hand time. Alex Yungeberg faded the last 100m and ran a 55.4 hand time.

Our hurdlers performed well, except for my two senior boys who managed to sign up late for their 110 event. They ended running in the last heat with some frosh and JV boys going 1st and 2nd. Elliot Frank had a particularlly strong showing running 16.7 despite 5 stepping the last hurdle. He has made significant improvements in his speed and hurdle technique. Trevor Hayward, our other hurdler, is coming off a huge injury he suffered in football and still ran a very respectable first race.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment of the meet came in the long jump when Shelbie Carmony twisted her ankle upon landing. We believe that it is a sprain and she has ligament damage but nothing is broken. She will be out for a couple o' weeks. She will be missed, but that is better than what we first thought. We though she might be done for the season. That injury though, was followed up with a huge effort by Jordan Gray. His first jump was big, over 21' I am sure. But he fouled slightly. He followed that effort up with a 20'7, and then a 20'8 1/2 winning the event. Our jumpers were done for the day.

We left the meet after the 200m. That decision was made weeks before. We did not want to arrive back in Sandy at 1:00am. As it was we arrived at 10:00pm. The traffic coming home was much better. So was my outlook on life.