Collinsville Boys Track Takes Part In Two Big Meets
By Mark Jurgena
On April 9th, the Collinsville boys track team took part in the gigantic Norm Armstrong Invitational at Belleville West. Athletes from 36 teams took part in the event.
Collinsville finished in 19th place in the team standings with 12 points. Minooka beat Edwardsville for the team title. The Indians scored 88 points outdistancing the Tigers by 20 points.
“Quite a few of the schools were from the northern half of the state,” said CHS coach Darryl Frerker. “They’ve had just as bad of weather as we have. The Belleville West meet has become one of those, ‘let’s head to Southern Illinois and get a decent meet in.’
“The competition was just outstanding.”
Kahok Medalists
Two Kahoks were able to medal in their events. Due to the size of the field at West, the top eight finishers in a given event were rewarded with a medal.
CHS sophomore KJ Thorps-Watt took 3rd place in the triple jump with a best leap of 43’ 8”. Jordan Brooks of Edwardsville was the winner at 44’ 7”.
In the discus, Jonathan Sewell had a personal record of 160’ 0” and took 3rd place at the event. Ashton Noble of Roxana spun out a toss of 165’ 4”.
Kahok Devin Habermehl finished just out of the medals in 9th place, but set a PR and notched the 8th place spot on the freshman/sophomore top ten all-time. That mark is now 133’ 9”.
Top Ten Lists
Additionally, several other Kahoks pushed their way onto top ten lists all-time for Kahok track & field.
In the pole vault, Ben Stallings and Ayden Gratzl moved into the Frosh/Soph top ten at #4 and #5 respectively. Stallings went 11’ 11/2” inches while Gratzl went 10’ 7”. Both marks were also personal records.
In the 3200 meters, Trey Peterson moved to #2 all-time in the F/S top ten with a time of 10:16.48. He finished in 12th place at the West Invite.
Cameron Jones ran a PR in the 110m high hurdles which put him at #9 on the F/S list with a time of 17.99 seconds.
Personal Records
Other Kahoks who ran PR at the elite meet were Jalek Nelson and Jeremiah Yarbough in 400m, Brain Castro in the 800m, and Andrew Gonski in the 1600m.
Others registering PRs were Dylan Meek in the 3200m and Eric Stuber in the triple jump.
Edwardsville Fr/So meet
On April 5th the Kahoks took part in the 11-team Edwardsville Freshman/Sophomore meet. CHS placed third at the meet with 117 points, only seven behind 2nd place East St. Louis. Edwardsville won the meet with 138 points.
Sophomore Trey Peterson had a huge day winning both the 800 and 1600 meter races. He also helped the 4×800 meter team to a 4th place finish.
Peterson began his day by helping move the 4×8 squad into 4th place from 6th place by running a 2:05 in his leg of the race. Sebastian Munoz, Castro, and Gonski were part of the team that now sits at #4 F/S top ten with a time of 8:57.96.
In the open 800, Peterson ran an even better 2:04.11. That time placed him at #8 on the all-time F/S list.
Finally, he ran a 4:46.99 in the 1600 meters to win it.
“He felt good, he looked good, he ran well,” said Frerker.
Field Events
Devin Habermehl took 2nd place in the shot put and grabbed the #8 spot in the F/S top ten at 42’ 6”.
Zach Chambers got 3rd place in the shot put with a heave of 41’ 4” and 3rd place in the discus with a toss of 131’1”. That discus is #8 all-time on the F/S list. Both tosses were PRs.
Habermehl was briefly at #10 on the F/S list in the discus at 126’ 1”. He ended up in the 3rd place at the meet.
KJ Thorps-Watt medaled in all four of his events, three of them were in field events.
He took 2nd place in the high jump at 5’ 9” and 3rd place in the long jump with a personal record of 19’ 3”. That leap is now #7 on the F/S list.
His triple jump leap of 43’ 9” landed him in 2nd place at the meet.
Track Events
In the sprints, Cameron Rodgers took second place in both the 100 and 200 meters.
He ran an 11.65 in the 100 just behind Kenneth Buchanon of East St. Louis who ran an 11.21.
In the 200 meters, Rodgers ran a 23.81 but finished behind Buchanon. The Flyer sprinter ran a 22.46.
Thorps-Watt grabbed his fourth medal of the meet by running a PR in the 300 hurdles with a time of 46.67 seconds. That time was good for 5th place.
Gonski returned to the track and just missed a medal by finishing in 6th place in the 800 with a time of 2:15.68. He took 7th place in the 1600 with a time of 5:04.93.
The boys team returns to the track tomorrow at the Granite City Invitational.
