Just like that, the track season is off and running. In the past two weeks, the track team has already competed in three different meets with another one just around the corner. The SLUH JV/C 1 meet kicked off the season on March 23 followed by the annual McCullough-Douglass meet on the 26th, and just this past Saturday, the Jr. Bills took home the team trophy at the Lindbergh Invitational.

The JV and C teams made their debut on March 23 in a competitive meet that featured teams such as CBC, and De Smet. On a cold and damp day the Jr. Bills competed well against their MCC rivals and came away with some impressive results. On the distance side of things SLUH managed to win both the 4x800 meter relay as well as have the top three finishers in the 3200. They also put six runners in the top eight in the 1600. 

The middle distance squad also had similar results, taking four of the top eight spots in the 800 and a 6th place finish in the 400. The sprints team also performed very well, especially considering the cold conditions of the day, putting many runners near the front of each race. 

The field events were a little more difficult to pull off in the conditions, however. Due to the rain, the pole vault was called off for the safety of the athletes. That didn’t stop the other field events, though, and SLUH competed well in the other events. Freshmen Will Martin and Nathan Lepak took charge of SLUH’s jumps for the day competing in the high jump, long jump, and triple jump. To finish out the field events, SLUH also had good performances in all of the throwing events, giving many new members of the team a chance to compete for the first time and ultimately rounding out a good starting meet for the JV and C teams. 

The SLUH Varsity squad began its season at the McCullough-Douglass invitational against the top Missouri talent on a cold and windy March 26. Despite conditions that were far from perfect, several athletes put up elite performances that ranked them in the top 10 in the state in their event. Among these performances were sophomore Jacobi Oliphant, who won the 110-meter hurdles by about half a second, running a time of 15.86 seconds, and sophomore Ryan Wingo who won the 200 in a time of 22.60 seconds. Along with these two strong individual performances, the 4x400 (first place) and 4x200 (second place) relays put up top times, ranking themselves near the top Missouri talent so far this season.

Along with the strong sprint performances, varsity jumpers seniors Eric Piening and Andy Harris put up respectable results, earning themselves top three spots in their events. Piening started the day off at the high jump where he kicked off his season jumping 1.88 meters (or about 6-feet, 2 inches for our American friends) earning himself a second place finish and a great first performance of the year. Over on the triple jump, Harris also hopped his way to a second place finish, jumping 12.65 meters (about 41.5 feet) in the triple jump. This pair of second place finishes made a statement about the strength of the jumping duo this year going forward.

Across the middle distance and distance events, the Jr. Bills were able to go up against the top state competition and, though they were missing a few key parts of the squad, many of the former XC Bills, now Track Bills, got led to fast times and PRs setting them up for many fast times throughout the season.

After their success at the McCullough-Douglass Invitational, the Varsity squad traveled to Lindbergh High School to compete last Saturday. With high wind speeds and a bit of a colder temperature, the conditions weren’t ideal but that didn’t stop the team from having a day and taking home the team trophy by over 50 points. 

Despite the windy conditions last Saturday, the flowing hair of the distance and mid-distance squad returned to avenge what seemed to be a slow start the previous week. Starting off with the 4x800 relay, the Jr. Bills seemed to be much more comfortable earning themselves second place finishes on both the JV and Varsity levels. After respectable performances in the 4x800 relay, the Jr. Bills hit their stride in the 1600 race, going first and second on both the JV and Varsity levels. 

With strong performances from senior Grant Brawley (4:27) and senior Sean Kellogg (4:30) the Varsity team took 18 points from the 1600m. Although he was not in the Varsity race, sophomore Mason Scargall set the meet record for the JV 1600 (4:40) and would have finished fourth in the Varsity 1600. 

The dominance carried over to the 400, where Wingo won the race with a time of 50.72. Later on in the day, the squad would again finish in the top two in the 800, with Nicholas Purschke winning the JV race with a time of 2:14.6 and Justin Glass placing second in the Varsity race with a time of 2:08.4. 

The team once again showed its dominance across the JV and Varsity levels in the distance medley relay (1200-400-800-1600) where the JV team finished first (12:04) and Varsity took a second place finish (10:51). The team then closed the day out with another strong relay with a first place finish in the Varsity 4x400 with a time of 3:33.8.

The sprints team had a very impressive day, coming away with three meet records on the varsity level and scoring 64 points. To kick off the day for the sprints team, Oliphant set a meet record in the 110 hurdles, running a time of 15.30, followed by senior Connor Greninger, who tied for third in a time of 15.80. 

Just minutes after that, Wingo set the meet record in the 100-meter dash in a time of 10.64, which broke the meet record by 0.35 seconds. In the 300 hurdles, senior Keshon Parker (fourth place) and Greninger (fifth place) closed out the day for the sprints team. 

Wingo followed up his first meet record with another one in the 200, running a time of 21.84, followed by Oliphant, who placed third in a time of 22.57. Overall, the sprints team had a very impressive day and look to continue to ride this train of success into the later parts of the season.

The field events team made their presence known through multiple great performances throughout the day. Piening once again had a great day, placing second in the high jump with a height of 1.90 meters (6.23 feet), falling only to the state champion from last year who could only make it five centimeters higher than Piening. 

Piening also came back for the triple jump where he and Harris managed to grab second and third place respectively. Harris also had an impressive fifth place finish in the long jump with a distance of 5.54 meters. In the pole vault  sophomore Elijah Smith placed third with a height of 3.05 meters, and senior Eli Dernlan finished sixth with a height of 2.44 meters. The field events team scored their final points in the javelin, where senior Andrew Renaud finished fourth and senior Corey Luaders finished fifth. 

The team’s success over the last two weeks has been a good sign of things to come as the team enters the heart of the season. The Varsity team will compete at the Eureka Invitational today after school. The V2 squad is set to compete on the varsity level at the All Catholic Invitational hosted by Chaminade and give many athletes on the team some good competition this weekend.