WINCHESTER — Prom couldn’t stop Sherando this year.
Despite having several athletes leave early to attend the annual school event and some athletes unable to compete due to injury, the Warriors boys’ track & field team captured the 56th Apple Blossom Invitational on Saturday at James Wood High School’s Kelican Stadium.
In the final event, a 4×400-meter relay team that featured only two of its regular members took third to help Sherando hold off Clarke County — which took second in the 4×400 — by half a point for the team title. The Warriors scored six points for a total of 112.5 points, while the Eagles’ eight points boosted them to a 112 total.
Sherando and Clarke County headlined a strong day for local teams overall in the 13-team competition. Handley placed third (99 points), James Wood (94) placed fourth and local performers won 12 of the 16 events, with Colonels senior Eli Clark (1,600 and 3,200) and Clarke County sophomore Isaac Nei (400 and long jump) each winning two individual events. Millbrook took last with 1 point.
There will never be a year where Sherando is at full strength for the ABI, because the school always schedules its prom the same day as the event. Last year, Warriors coach Brad Symons decided to enter his team into Fauquier’s Falcon Track Classic because it took place the day before the school prom. Only a handful of Sherando athletes competed at the ABI last year. This year, the Falcon Track Classic won’t take place until this coming Friday, and the ABI was Sherando’s best option for a meet on this particular weekend.
The Warriors received points from expected places — two-time high jump state champion Noah Harris won that event by two inches with a mark of 6-2, and three-time state discus medalist and fellow senior Micah Carlson won that event by 11 feet, 7 inches with a mark of 152-1. But generally speaking, it took a lot of grit and lot of athletes raising their performances levels to make Saturday’s championship happen.
For example, Saturday’s 4×400 team did not feature Harris or senior Ryan Maki, who helped the 4×800 team win in his only event of the day. But the Warriors still recorded a strong time of 3:37.65, just 1.08 seconds off the relay’s best time of the year. Regular 4×400 runners Tristan Hantute-Abebe (leadoff leg Saturday) and Jack Bryant (anchor) were joined by freshman Quintin Priest and sophomore Nate Lloyd, the second and third legs, respectively.
“Some kids that usually don’t maybe run in certain events stepped up,” Symons said. “Our 4×400 team, Quin, a freshman, comes in and says, ‘I’ll run this,’ and does a great job, and Nate did, too. They did it for the team, and that’s phenomenal.
“I couldn’t be more proud of these guys, and how they fought. We knew [Clarke County] was coming for us. It came down to the end, and we got the job done.”
When a team wins by half a point, every scoring performance truly matters, and Symons said it was big for junior Andrew Ahrens to score two points in the penultimate event, the 3,200. Ahrens placed seventh in 10:56.05 in an event that Clarke County scored eight points in.
Symons liked the effort of a lot of people who didn’t contribute to Sherando’s point total, too.
“We had a lot of [personal records] today,” Symons said. “We had people who didn’t score points, but they’re getting better. There was good competition today for that. Last week at Colgan, we thought that was going to be a good meet, but it rained, the meet got moved back a day, and people dropped out. You need that competition.”
Sherando won without injured hurdler Sunil Dutt and a limited Carlson.
Carlson is only able to throw right now because of an injury two weeks ago, but the future college decathlete made the most of his limited work on Saturday. Carlson — who often threw farther than 150 feet last year in the discus and had a top mark of 154-11 — had not thrown farther than 142-6 coming into Saturday, so to achieve a 152-1 was important to him.
“It is great to get that momentum back,” Carlson said. “Starting off really rough, having an injury and being really inconsistent, that was a huge booster today. I’m ready to go for more.”
Carlson participated in a ceremony on Wednesday in which he signed with NCAA Division II Frostburg State University in Maryland.
“I really like the campus,” said Carlson, who will receive an athletic scholarship the second semester of his freshman year. “It made me feel like home.”
Javelin is not offered at Virginia high school meets, but Carlson has traveled to Pennsylvania to compete in two meets for that event to prepare himself for being a college decathlete.
“I think will be a very fun part of my life, being a decathlete,” Carlson said. “You get to do everything. Javelin and discus are like my two favorite events. Javelin is kind of fighting for top.”
Maki led off for the 4×800 team, which also featured Hatcher Smith, Thomas Miles and Jed Bell. They recorded a time of 8:18.22, 5.45 seconds ahead of Clarke County’s second-place team.
Sherando was also led by Hantute-Abebe (second in 100, 11.31, fourth in 200, 22.68); Bryant (second in 400, 51.22); Harris (third in long jump, 20-4.75); Quincy Walker (third in discus, 131-1, fifth in shot put 44-4.5); Chester Konisiewicz (fourth in 1,600, 4:50.47); Emerson Fletcher (fourth in shot put, 44-11); Donovan Blackwell (fifth in 100, 11.48); and the 4×100 relay team (fifth in 46.12).
Clarke County’s Nei did just about everything he could to lead the Eagles to the team title.
In the long jump, he moved up from second to first place on his last attempt and set a PR with a mark of 22-6.75, 5.25 inches better than Brentsville’s Tyler McClellan.
In the 400, he found an extra gear in the last 75 meters and won in a season PR of 50.84, 0.38 ahead of Sherando’s Bryant.
He took second in the 200 with the area’s second-best time this year in 22.34, with a remarkable surge at the end by meet Most Valuable Performer and Strasburg freshman Cooper Colcombe (22.22) preventing him from victory.
He closed his day by helping the 4×400 team take second in 3:37.10. Joseph Stem, Brody Ellis and Jackson Ellis also ran on that team.
Coming into Saturday, Nei’s best career long jump was 21-4.
“Pretty early in the season, jumping mid-22s, I know can maybe hit 23 potentially at states,” Nei said. “That’d be amazing. That’s the goal.”
Nei hasn’t matched last year’s top time of 49.44 in the 400, but he’s had a season PR every time he’s ran it this year. That’s the event he’s training for the most on the track. Nei is looking to improve on last year’s state meet performance, when he took second in the 400 and fourth in the 100 in Class 2.
Nei said the Eagles’ competition has helped this year. Clarke County’s schedule has featured invitationals at two Class 4 schools and one Class 3 school this year.
“It pushes me to PR when I race against people who are faster than me,” Nei said.
Clarke County coach Andre Kidrick said he thinks there’s only been a few jumps where Nei hasn’t fouled going back to last year’s state meet. Kidrick told Nei he should start practicing at a faster pace like he would at a meet, and that appeared to help him on Saturday. Nei getting on a roll in the long jump would be another thing he does that will help Clarke County.
“He’s so uber-athletic and uber-talented,” Kidrick said. “Give him two weeks at any event and he’ll be one of the top athletes in the state. He’s just that athletic.”
Clarke County also received a win from Jackson Ellis in the 800 (2:01.42 to win by 1.61 seconds). Ellis also helped the 4×800 team of Aidan Kreeb, Brody Ellis and James Casey set a school record of 8:23.63 in taking second.
The Eagles were also led by Landon Horton (second in 1,600, 4:43.52, fourth in 3,200, 10:41.09); Elijah Abdulbarr (third in 110 hurdles, 15.95); the 4×100 team of Chris Reid, Carson Chinn, Wyatt Palmer and Lincoln Booker (third, 44.74); Brody Ellis (fourth in 800, 2:09.98); Booker (fourth in 300 hurdles, 43.71); Matthew Lisk (fifth in 800, 2:11.84); Casey (fifth in 1,600, 4:50.70); and Stem (fifth in 110 hurdles, 16.94).
Handley was without Rylan Stribling due to him resting from an injury (he’ll run in the Dogwood Classic next weekend in Charlottesville) and Hassan Akanbi, who was on a football recruiting trip.
The Judges were led by Jaishaun Offutt (won the shot put by 11 feet, 5.75 inches with a mark of 57-3.25); Isaiah Baxter (won the triple jump by 10 inches with a mark of 42-6); Savion Thomas (second in triple jump, 41-8, third in 100, 11.32, third in 200, 22.57); the 4×100 team of Josiah Miller, Jamir Washington, Brendan Campbell and Thomas (second, 44.56); Will Thomas (second in 3,200, 10:16.30), Noah Meleason (third in 3,200, 10:24.23); Carson Green (third in shot put, 44-11.5); Washington (fourth in 100, 11.46); Brendan Campbell (fourth in high jump, 5-10); the 4×400 team (fourth, 3:50.83); and Brock Ashe (fifth in 300 hurdles, 43.77).
James Wood’s Clark won the 1,600 by 7.53 seconds in 4:35.99 and 3,200 by 12.69 seconds in 10:03.61. Jorel Baltimore (15.59) and Duncan Stanton (15.66) took first and second, respectively, in the 110 hurdles and second and third, respectively, in the 300 hurdles, with Baltimore finishing in 41.83 and Stanton in 42.24. Baltimore also ran on the winning 4×400 team with Conner Kenney-Fitzner, Ivan Andrews and Britain Wenig (3:35.43 to win by 1.67 seconds).
The Colonels were also led by Jude Miler (second in shot put, 45-9.5, fifth in discus, 129-4); Andrews (third in 400, 52.35); and Trey Guynn (fourth in discus, 129-8).
Millbrook received its point from Peter Warner (eighth in the 3,200, 10:59.39).
In addition to winning the 200, Strasburg’s Colcombe won the 100 in 11.09 and helped the 4×100 team to victory in 43.78.
For more coverage on Saturday’s meet, see Tuesday’s edition of The Winchester Star.
— Contact Robert Niedzwiecki at rniedzwiecki@winchesterstar.com
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