By STEVE CORNELIUS, CJ Sports Editor
Somerset — With a wide variety of talented athletes in nearly every event, the Pulaski boys track team had no problem remaining undefeated in their Warrior Classic win at Southwestern High School on Tuesday night.
The Maroons scored a meeet-high 149 points to win the title — outdistancing their nearest rival, Madison Central, by over 50 points. The Maroons placed in the top four of every individual event to amass their large sum of points.
Somerset finished sixth in the boys team standings with 62.5 points, and Southwersten finished eighth with 47 points. In the girls standings, Pulaski County finished fourth with 90 points, Southwestern finished seventh with 42 points and Somerset finished 10th with 21 points.
After recovering from a football injury to his non-throwing arm, Pulaski senior Daryn Meece was back in typical form as he pulled off the strongman double with wins in the shot put and discus. Meece won the shot put with a best of 43’01”, and won the discus with a best of 127’03”.
“Daryn is a veteran now, he has a lot of experience,” Pulaski boys track coach Josh Roberts said. “He has scored a ton of points, and this year has been an outstanding leader for our team.”
The Maroons got more solid points in the hurdle races, as junior Zach Wooldridge won the 110-meter hurdles with a time of 16.29 and finished second in the 300-meter hurdles.
“Overall it was a great performance by our team,” Roberts said. “I believe we still have a lot of room for improvement, and a lot of work to do if we want to keep having success. We scored in every event and in some cases we scored twice.”
“Our team understands this is a team effort and that we have to have everybody contributing,” Roberts continued. “RC White had a great night. RC is a hard worker and a huge asset to our team. I was really proud of Alex Abner, Tyler Goins, Ralph Letner and Alec Woolridge. All those guys gave great effort and contributed in a lot of ways.”
The Lady Maroons earned two individual gold medals with field event wins by Brooke Cable and Heather Boatman. Cable, a senior, won the girls high jump with a best clearance of 5’0”. Boatman, a junior, won the shot put with a best effort of 34’11”.
The Somerset boys 3200-meter realy team won gold with a time of 9:02.9. Team members on the winning Jumper relay team were Brent Joplin, Austin Adams, Jarrod Wesley and Jon Claude Burlew.
Other local top finishers included Jasmine Strunk (PC) 100 meters - 3rd, DJ Townsend (SHS) 100 meters & 200 meters - 2nd, Brittany Warren (PC) 400 meters - 3rd, RC White (PC) 400 meters - 3rd, Paige Ingram (PC) 3200 meters - 2nd, Jimmy Goldson (PC) 3200 meters - 3rd, Chris Muse (PC) long jump - 2nd, DJ Townsend (SHS) triple jump - 3rd, Danay Fothergill (SW) high jump - 2nd, Alex Abner (PC) high jump - 2nd, Rachel Colyer (PC) pole vault - 2nd, Jacob Heinen (PC) pole vault 2nd, and Corey Mitchell (SW) pole vault - 3rd.
Local top relay teams included Pulaski boys 3200 relay team of Levi Lima, Jimmy Goldson, Austin Hyden and George Lee - 3rd, Pulaski girls 1600 relay team of Rachel Colyer, Allie Tilley, Sarah Crawford and Brittany Warren - 2nd, and Pulaski boys 1600 relay team of Alec Wooldridge, RC White, Bryan White and Ralph Letner - 2nd.
