By Bill Morgan, Staff Writer
Everything went pretty much the way Paul Schmidt wanted it to last Saturday in Moorhead for the section 8AA championship meet.
“We had a great day individually,” he said. “Relay wise and as an overall team.”
The Bulldogs will be sending five track stars to state in Sidney Boros, Kevin Andres, Jordan Gruenes and Austin Hemmelgarn. Boros is part of two relay teams (4x200M, 4x400M) and also took first in the 200M. Andres is part of both relay teams and will also compete in the 400M.
Myres will compete in the 110M hurdles.
Becker finished sixth overall, scoring 60 points. The meet was won by Moorhead with 117, followed by Alexandria with 77.5, Brainerd was third with 69 points.
“It was nice to know that we were that close to third place in this 17-team meet,” said Schmidt.
The top two individual and relay teams advance to the state meet at Hamline Friday and Saturday, June 8-9.
Section 8AA
The day got off on the right foot with David Myres running a fabulous race in the 110M high hurdles, taking first place with a new personal record of 15.44.
Austin Hemmelgarn followed that up with a good race to finish fourth in the 100 meter dash.
Sam Ricker ran a good race in the 1600M and finished in sixth place. Only four seconds separated first place from fourth place in this race.
The boys 4x200M relay team of Sydney Boros, Jordan Gruenes, Austin Hemmelgarn and Kevin Andres ran an almost perfect race to take first place and become the first relay team in 20 years to advance to the state tournament.
“Our handoffs were great and we ran really well to just edge out second place Rocori with a time of 1:29.26 seconds,” said Coach Schmidt.
Next came Kevin Andres’ race in the open 400M. Andres came in as the top seed but was upended by Moorhead's Cole Crompton to take second place and advance to the state meet Friday.
“Kevin might have been a little bit gassed from having to exert extra effort in the 4x200M race just 30 minutes earlier,” said the coach.
Sidney Boros took first in the 200 meters, dethroning Jack Young, who has won this event the last three years.
“It was an absolutely amazing start for Sid as he blew out of the blocks on his was to a 22.80 time and a first place finish,” said Schmidt.
The final race of the day brought a dramatic finish as the 4x400M relay team of Boros, Gruenes, Hemmelgarn and Andres broke a 25-year-old section 8AA record by beating Moorhead in a photo finish by one-hundredth of a second. Their new record time — which will also be a new school record — was 3:23.32.
“We are super excited to take these guys down to the state tournament and see what they can do on the states’ biggest track and field stage,” said Schmidt.
Live results can be followed on Wayzata timing and Friday and Saturday's meets start at 9 a.m.
