5 athletes to compete at state track

By Sam Waller

Albany will have five entries vying for titles Friday, May 12, at the Class 2A state track and field meet.

The competition gets underway at 9:00 a.m. Friday at Mike A. Myers Stadium in Austin with field events and the 3,200. Other running events will start at 5:00 p.m.

The Class 2A meet will be held in tandem with the Class 5A meet.

Returning to the state meet after earning medals last year are juniors Adam Hill in the boys hurdles races and Kiana Roberson in the girls throwing events. Hill claimed silver in the 110-meter hurdles last year and has added the 300 hurdles and 1600 relay to his workload. Roberson, last year’s bronze medalist in the shot put, also qualified in the discus.

The meet schedule will have Roberson in the discus at 9:00 a.m. and shot put at 12:30 p.m. Hill will run the 110 hurdles at 5:45 p.m. and 300 hurdles at 7:35 p.m. The 1600 relay will start at 8:45 p.m.

Both Hill and Roberson expect the experience gained last year to be a benefit Friday.

“I know what the atmosphere is like,” Roberson said. “I’ve been there before and got third last year. I’m ready to go compete this year with more confidence on my side.”

Hill said with the season ending no matter what the result makes him eager to compete.

“Last year was a good experience,” he said. “I know I’m going to run those two races, and then I’m done for the year after that. There’s no other race, so I might as well give it my all.”

While both hold hopes of equaling or bettering their sophomore results, Roberson enters the meet as the top seed in both of her events. State seeds are based solely on results from regional finals.

Roberson threw 129-1 in the discus at regional meet and 40-6¼ in the shot put. One of three qualifiers to throw over 120 feet in the discus, she has a personal best of 138 set at the Albany Roaring Lion Relays in March. Her regional effort in the shot put was a career best and she enters with the only 40-foot throw in the field.

“I’m sitting first, but you never know what could happen,” she said. “I’m just going to hope for the best and do my best.”

Hill is seeded second in the 110 hurdles at 14.53 seconds, just 0.09 behind defending champ Jkoby Williams of Beckville. In the 300 hurdles, Hill is seeded fourth at 40.31, but ran 39.99 in the regional prelims. Williams is the top qualifier at 39.54.

“I think I can win both of them,” Hill said. “There are four of us who are all close in both races. There’s no reason I shouldn’t win.”

In the 1600 relay, Albany is seeded eighth after running 3:28.91 at the regional meet.

“Our goal, obviously, is to get on the medal stand,” coach Rod Britting said. “We’re sitting toward the bottom of the group, but we ran in windy conditions. I think everybody can knock off a second or so, and if we do that, I think we’ll be right in the mix.”

The relay consists of Cason Fairchild, Samuel Rosas, London Fuentes, and Hill with Jayce Tinkle and Cole Chapman as alternates. Tinkle subbed for Rosas in the regional finals.

“We’ve worked for this,” Fuentes said. “We’ve made some adjustments with people, but everyone’s taking it well and working the same amount. Hopefully, we’ll fuel up and finish it off with a bang.”

Britting said the setting – the final event of the night with a crowd in excess of 30,000 on hand – should help spur Albany’s effort.

“I think every kid there will feel the atmosphere,” he said. “If ours don’t get overwhelmed by it, they can stay relaxed and run hard.”

Britting said practices since regional have focused on shaving time in each part of the race, from curves to straightaways to exchanges.

“We’ve been spending a lot of time working on our speed,” he said. “The cardiovascular is either there or not by this time of year, so we’re working fast-twitch muscles and trying to bring our time down a little bit.”

By Friday, all that will be left to do is put it all together for one race.

“We want the kids to enjoy it,” Britting said. “But we’ve got guys who’ve won enough that just getting there is not their goal. They want to do something once they get there.”