Cubs, Lady Cubs take the track in Albany
By Sam Waller
Albany Junior High Cubs and Lady Cubs track teams used their home meet Friday, March 21as their final tuneup before district competition.
The junior high district meet is Saturday, March 29 at Cisco. Field events start at 9:00 a.m. with running events starting at 1:00 p.m.
The Albany meet was a ribbon meet with no team scoring kept. Boys coach Ryder Peacock said the main goal was to get back in competition mode before district.
“In the field events, you can see a little bit more because they placed those out,” Peacock said. “We won the pole vault and triple jump and were in the top three in the shot put, discus and high jump. It was good coming off spring break to see those guys pick up where they left off.”
For the eighth grade boys, Levi Murphy led a 1-2-3 sweep in the pole vault, and Blake Britting won the triple jump as well as tying for second in the high jump. Jacob Thurman was second in the discus and third in the shot put.
For the seventh grade boys, Parker Rose and Iathan Torres went 1-2 in the pole vault and Adrian Salazar was third in the long jump.
While official times and results were not kept for running events, Peacock was pleased with the showing.
“Our times were really good,” he said. “We had some guys run personal-bests. Our eighth grade mile relay really closed the meet out. We’ve been talking about trying to beat four minutes and they ran 3:57.”
It was much the same case for girls coach Ashlyn Bevel.
“The girls performed really well - all of them did,” Bevel said. “It was a ribbon meet, so it’s difficult to judge overall results, but we had a lot of kids get ribbons.”
For the eighth grade girls, Sawyer Shoaf won the shot put and was second in the discus. Placing third in field event were Hattie Fikes in the high jump, Kenzee Roysdon in the shot put, Hailey Gleitz in the discus, Cayla Barnes in the long jump, and Keeley Britting in the triple jump.
For the seventh grade girls, Loralie Balliew won the shot put with Burkley Yeates third and was second in the discus. Karter Thompson won the triple jump with Paxton Pipes third.
One highlight for Bevel was each grade’s 1600 relay teams winning.
“Their times both improved, which was good to see,” Bevel said. “We’re just going to continue to work hard for district.”
Peacock said the athletes are putting together good performances at the right time.
“We’re starting to see some guys drop some time and gain some confidence in events,” he said. “That’s what you want to see as you head into the final week of the season.”
