ISSAQUAH – The Mount Si track team didn’t bow to the pressure of competing against nine other teams in the KingCo League meet last week. At the end of the meet, two Wildcats stood tall as league champions, and a total of 10 Mount Si athletes had performed well enough to advance to the district meet to be held this week.
Ashley Van Oeveran went home as a league champion in the shot. She threw it 34 feet, 6 1/2 inches to win the event. The second-place throw was a 32-foot, 10-inch effort by Tory Mauseth of Skyline.
The ‘Cats’ Dan Haakenson threw the discus 162 feet, 6 inches, a feat that also garnered him a league championship.
Nick Verbon took second place in the 110-meter high hurdles in the preliminary races on Wednesday with a time of 15.31 seconds, and ran to a second-place finish in the finals on Friday in a time of 15.37 seconds. Verbon also took fourth in the 300-meter high hurdles in the preliminaries with a time of 41.63 seconds, then improved and placed second in the finals with a time of 40.47 seconds. His seventh-place long jump finish did not qualify him for the district meet. He jumped 19 feet, 10
3/4 inches, while Nils Bubeck took eighth place with a jump of 19 feet, 10 1/4 inches.
Verbon, a junior, was disappointed that he wasn’t able to take first in the 110-meter hurdles, as he was ranked as the top hurdler in the league.
“I’m disappointed in second because I came into league with the best time,” Verbon said. “But I was really happy about second in the 300-meter hurdles.”
Verbon said he just wants to run a good, clean race at district, and hopefully win.
“It will be tough, but I think I can do it,” Verbon said.
The 4×400 relay team of Matthias Klauser, Jacob Waggoner, Craig Fanger and Dan Barry took third place with a time of 3:32, good enough for it to advance to the district meet. The girls’ 4×400 relay team of Kelly Fletcher, Jessica Hanna, Ashley Wiegardt and Kristen Berndt also qualified to run at district by finishing in sixth place in a time of 4:22.
Barry took second in the 400-meter run with a time of 51.46 seconds, and Jacob Waggoner placed third in the 800-meter with a time of 2:00. Both advanced to district.
Jessica Scalzo ran the second-best time at the meet for the 3,200-meters with a time of 11:27, and also ran a 5:22 mile in the finals for a sixth and final spot in the district meet. She will also run the two mile at the district meet.
Teammate Sheena Kern missed qualifying for district in the two-mile by one spot. She finished the race with a time of 12:03. Katie Troy of Bellevue edged her out of sixth place with a time of 11:56.
Jacob Limestall was second in the pole vault with height of 12 feet, while Haakenson took third in the shot put with a throw of 45 feet, 9
3/4 inches.
Tanya Smart took second place in the discus with a throw of 109 feet, 11 inches. Van Oeveran placed fifth in the event with a throw of 95 feet, 7 inches.
Freshman Kristen Berndt took sixth place in the 100-meter hurdles in the preliminaries with a time of 17.05 seconds, and placed sixth in the finals with a time of 17.36 seconds. She, too, will advance to the district meet. Berndt also ran the 300-meter hurdles, taking seventh in the preliminaries with a time of 50.46 seconds and eighth in the finals with a time of 51.42 seconds, missing out on a spot at district.
“I wish I would have made it, but I’m going [to district] in the 100-meter hurdles, and I’m pretty happy with that,” Berndt said.
Wiegardt took sixth place in the long jump with a leap of 15 feet, 4
1/4 inches. She has jumped 17 feet this season and was ranked fourth on the Eastside in the event. She also qualified for district in the triple jump by taking sixth place with a jump of 33 feet, 2
3/4 inches.
The team competes at 4 p.m. Wednesday at the 3A Sea-King District tournament at Chief Sealth Stadium in Seattle, and resumes competition at 4 p.m. on Friday.
