Morgan Rode sports@wolfrivermedia.com
Leader photo by Morgan Rode Wittenberg-Birnamwood’s Maddy Pietz crosses the finish line in the 4x400 relay at Veterans Memorial Stadium in La Crosse on Friday.
Leader photo by Morgan Rode Clintonville’s Allysin Booth, middle, jumps over a hurdle during the 100 hurdle preliminaries at Veterans Memorial Stadium in La Crosse on Friday.
The first day of the 2018 WIAA Track and Field State Championships featured near-ideal competing conditions for participating athletes.
Most of Friday’s meet at Veterans Memorial Stadium in La Crosse were preliminary events that determined who would be competing in Saturday’s finals. However, there were a few events that classified as finals.
Shawano’s Atty Wagner and Parker Pues were competing in two of the Division 1 final events on the day. Wagner cleared a height of 6 feet, 2 inches to tie for sixth in the high jump. Pues leaped to a distance of 21 feet, 2.5 inches to tie for 12th in the long jump.
Wagner was thrilled to finish on the podium, which includes each of the top-six finishers in each event. The finish also earned the Hawks two team points.
”I didn’t jump as well as I wanted to today but to know I still got on the podium is just a crazy feeling,” Wagner said. “All I wanted to do was make it to state, so to make it on the podium, I couldn’t ask for more.”
While Pues, a junior, did not finish as well as he hoped, he was still thrilled to be part of the state meet and hopes it can motivate him going into next year.
“It feels like a good accomplishment (making it to state) but knowing that I could have done a lot better than I did makes it a little less special,” Pues said. “This gives me a lot of motivation for next year, I’m excited. I don’t want to come here next year and get let down again.”
Shawano’s Payden Buck will compete in the pole vault on Saturday.
Bonduel’s 4x400-meter relay team of Eli Mastey, Craig Rusch, Isaac Banker and Jared Wondra finished 17th in the preliminaries, failing to qualify for the finals. The quartet finished the relay in 3 minutes, 35.56 seconds.
Clintonville’s Allysin Booth took part in the Division 2 100 hurdles and high jump. Booth finished tied for ninth in the high jump with a height of 5 feet and qualified for the 100 hurdles finals by finishing third in the preliminaries with a time of 15.21 seconds.
Despite qualifying for the finals, Booth was disappointed in her time in the 100 hurdles.
”It wasn’t my best race, I hit a couple hurdles and had a really bad start,” Booth said. “I wasn’t really confident in that race at all. I think I lost focus on my main event while trying to compete in the high jump.”
Booth will get the chance to focus all of her attention on the 100 hurdles on Saturday.
Menominee Indian’s Jarin Reiter took part in the 400 preliminaries in Division 3. His time of 53.05 seconds was good enough for a 14th-place finish.
Despite missing the finals, experiencing the state meet is something Reiter will never forget.
”I worked all four years of high school for this and now I’m finally here,” Reiter said. “It’s an unbelievable feeling. It’s everything I dreamed of and exactly what my coaches told me about. It was pretty overwhelming.”
The Wittenberg-Birnamwood track team sent several individuals into Division 2 competition, with the Chargers racking up plenty of top finishes.
Maddy Pietz won the 100 preliminaries with a time of 11.98 seconds, a new state record. The previous record was held by Milwaukee North’s Tasha Allen with a time of 11.99 seconds in 2008.
Pietz also qualified for the 400 finals after taking first in the preliminaries, finishing in 57.03 seconds. She also earned a fifth-place finish and spot on the podium in the long jump with a jump of 17 feet, 4 inches.
Paige Norrbom took second in the 300 hurdles preliminaries to qualify for the final. She finished the event in 45.74 seconds to win her heat.
The Chargers 4x200 relay team of Paige Norrbom, Chloe King, Emily Norrbom and Kylie Linke qualified for the finals with a time of 1 minute, 43.13 seconds in the preliminaries. The 4x400 relay team of Paige Norrbom, Linke, Emily Norrbom and Pietz also took second in the preliminaries with a time of 4 minutes, 0.59 seconds to qualify for the finals.
For tomorrow’s finals events, Witt-Birn coach Mike Balliett doesn’t want his team to overthink things.
“We just have to do what we have done all year,” Balliett said. “They are a focused and determined group.”
Kobe Miller will also represent the Witt-Birn boys at state, competing in the long jump on Saturday. Emily Norrbom will take part in the triple jump.