April 23, 2018 By Chris Varney
The Drake Relays announced its high school field over the weekend and there are a number of local area athletes that will be competing this week.
On Thursday, Stacey Slaven of South Tama will be in the high jump at 4:30 pm. This will be the third straight year that Slaven has made the field at Drake. The Junior took advantage of the indoor season to jump 5’4″ at a meet in Waverly on March 6. That mark has held up as tied for 10th best in the state but she has not jumped as well since so it will be interesting to see what Slaven will do this week. Hopefully, there will be good weather — last year there was rain and wind that drove the event indoors.
Friday will be a busy day for local athletes, starting with the girls 100 hurdles as the first event of the day. Sigourney’s Autumn Barthelman has to run in the very first race of the day — there will be a total of 4 heats. Grinnell’s Sienna Durr will be in the third heat and will be in lane 7. Junior Juru Okwaramoi of Dowling has the third facest time in the state and will be in the same heat as Durr. Benton’s Grace Martensen will be in the final heat and will be in the fast lane — lane 4.
After the boys 110 hurdles, the girls 100 meter dash has a scheduled start time of 8:30 am. HLV’s Haley Coats will be in the first heat and in the first lane. Darby Thomas of Council Bluffs Abraham Lincoln will be in lane 4 of Coats race — Thomas has the fastest time in the state at 12.31 seconds. Coats is ranked 25th. Benton’s Ellie Masten is in the final heat and will be in the fast lane — lane 4 as the 4th best time in the state. At the same time (8:30), East Marshall’s Justin Ridout will start throwing in the discus — Ridout ranks 6th in the state right now. Shortly after the girls 100, the boys will have their 4 heats — PCM’s Noah Anderson is in the first heat, Williamsburg’s Gage Hazen Fabor is in heat number two. Hazen Fabor will be in lane 3 right next to Sam Tudor of Waterloo West in 4 and Gage Clay of AHSTW in lane 5. Tudor and Clay are tied for the 4th best time at 10.93 seconds with Hazen Fabor 11th best at 11.0.
English Valley’s Madison Trimpe is scheduled to start throwing the discus at 9 am on Friday. Trimpe has been bothered by a sprained ligament injury in her arm but she expects to be healthy enough to compete and is the first E-V Bear athlete to make the Drake Relays field in a long time.
After her 100 hurdles heat, Durr will be focusing on the long jump along with Iowa Valley’s Cherisse Ward and both will start at 9:30 am Friday morning. Shortly afterward, South Tama’s Keith Keahna will start the high jump competition at 9:45 am. Keahna is scheduled to jump 18th on the list of 24 — he currently is tied for second best in the state at 6’8″. Miles Rupiper of Carroll Kuemper cleared 6’10” in a meet on Thursday. The Benton sprint medley relay team will be running at 9:49 am — the Bobcats may hit the track before Keahna jumps. Ellie Masten is part of this team so it will be her second race of the morning — Gabbi Garman, Elizabeth Masten and Shelby Hulsebus rounds out the sprint med team.
The finals of the 100 hurdles will be Friday at 10:29 am — Durr, Martensen, and Barthleman will all be candidates for this race. At 1:43 pm, the Benton girls 4×200 team of Martensen, Masten, Masten and Hulsebus will be competing. Benton currently has the 7th best time in the state — the best belonging to Pella who will be the favorite. Ellie Masten may have to quickly get ready for the 100 finals at 2:24 pm if she makes the field. The finals of the boys 100 is scheduled at 2:29 pm.
The 4×100 prelim heats will run Friday night — the girls will run at 5:33 pm with Benton, Williamsburg and Sigourney all in the field. The boys 4×100 will be at 6:29 pm with Williamsburg and Benton part of that field. There will be 80 girls and 80 boys teams competing in 10 heats each. The finals will be later on Friday night at 8:35 pm.
Macie Boots of HLV and Tyson Vander Linden of Lynnville-Sully will have to wait until Saturday to compete in the 400 hurdles. Boots will run at 12:45 pm and Vander Linden runs at 12:52. Both will have chances to win their race — Boots has the third best time in the state although Payton Wensel of Marion Linn-Mar is the favorite with a time thats over 3 seconds faster than anyone else. Vander Linden is about 2 seconds behind Austin West of Iowa City West. Anything, however, can happen on the blue oval.
Good luck to all the athletes at the 109th Drake Relays this week and let’s hope for good weather!