Red Devil Track teams take 1st and 2nd at State Championships

Submitted by carey.white on

The months of hard work paid big dividends this year as Springville’s girls and boys track teams went first and second at the State Championships held at Brigham Young University.  The Lady Red Devils team came in as the number one favorite, but had to fight to the end to secure their victory. 

Aimee Wheeler started things off on the first day of competition with a first place finish in the long jump.  Things continued the second day with Aimee Wheeler finishing second in the 100m and Lexi Eaton taking third.  Mindy Stapel was fifth in the 100m hurdles with a sophomore school record time.  Next up was the 4x100m relay team of Sarah Duncan, Lexi Eaton, Aimee Wheeler and Brooke Larsen.  As the dominate relay team in the state, they didn’t disappoint as they came home with the victory.  Mindy Stapel again came through in the 300m hurdles with a fourth place finish and another sophomore record.  This was followed by the medley relay team of Sarah Duncan, Brooke Larsen, Mindy Stapel and Kate Hullinger who place third with another school record performance.  Brooke Larsen saved her best performance of the year in the 400m with a fourth place finish.  The high jump competition would prove to be the turning point in the meet as favorite Lexi Eaton came in first and Mindy Stapel providing a huge second place finish.  As is the usual case the last event, 4x400m relay, would be a fight between Springville and Ogden for the state title.  The team of Brooke Larsen, Sarah Duncan, Aimee Wheeler and Lexi Eaton would take second with Ogden coming in seventh.  The final score was Springville 79 – Ogden 77.5.  This was the fifth year in a row that Coach Corey Wales and the Lady Red Devils would bring home a state trophy.

Springville’s boys team was led by some great performances which started on the first day with Joseph Christensen taking fourth place in the 1600m run.  Later in the day Nathan Israelsen would take fifth in the high jump to keep the momentum going.  The second day Zach Gardanier would prove the spark with a second place finish in the long jump.  He would later take fifth in both the 100m and 200m dashes.  The 4x100m relay team of Zach Gardanier, Trevor Church, Jeremy Jay and Jalon Miyasaki took third to continue the Red Devil dominance in the relay events.  Jeremy Jay would add some big points with a second place finish in the 300m hurdles with a school record time and a sixth place finish in the 110m hurdles.  The surprise of the day came when junior Grant Evans took third in the shot put adding valuable points to the boy’s total.  The second place trophy was secured in the last event of the day by the 4x400m relay team of Jalon Miyasaki, Trevor Church, Daniel Jones and Jeremy Jay as they came home with the victory and a school record time.

Attributions
by Jeff Wales, Head Track Coach