WICHITA — Iola High’s Emery Driskel is assured of a medal, by a slimmest of margins, in her final competition at the state track meet today. ELSEWHERE Friday, Southern Coffey County High’s Walker Harred is ending his throwing career on a high note. HUMBOLDT HIGH’S Bryce Isaac secured an eighth-place medal in the 3A boys triple jump, with a leap of 41’4.75” — on his last attempt. YATES CENTER High’s Kal Hamm earned one medal and is assured of two others, thanks to a whirlwind series of events Friday morning. MARMATON Valley High’s Brady Newman, Class 1A boys regional high jump champion, lost out on a state medal through a tie-breaker. Newman cleared 5’10”, good enough to tie for an eighth-place medal, but he was relegated to ninth after meet officials tallied up the number of misses.
Driskel’s time in the girls Class 4A 100-meter high hurdles preliminaries — 16.092 seconds — was .002 seconds faster than Kali Pitcock of Hays.
The top eight finishers in prelims qualify for finals; all eight also will receive state medals.
Driskel will cap her high school athletic career this morning at 9:30 at Wichita State University’s Cessna Stadium track.
This is Driskel’s third straight state appearance in the hurdles. She also medaled in 2014, finishing in eighth.
In Iola’s only other state action, the Mustang 4×800-meter quartet of Chase Regehr, Travis Hermstein, Kohl Endicott and Ethan Holloway will race this morning, at about 11:40.
Harred successfully defended his Class 1A discus title with a throw of 154 feet, 4 inches — nearly 12 feet longer than his nearest competitor.
In fact, Harred had the four longest throws of the day, and five of the top six.
The gold medal follows Harred’s silver medal earlier in the day in the shot put, where his best throw of the day went 50’4.25”.
Harred has a chance for a third medal this afternoon, when he competes in the javelin.
Adina Ratzlaff, SCC freshman, qualified for finals in the girls 400-meter dash with a time of 61.17 seconds, the third fastest mark of the day.
Chonnor Ludolph nabbed 12th place in the triple jump, leaping 39’2.75”.
The Lady Titans’ 4x-100-meter relay team of Kimberlyn Gunlock, Danielle Kasprzak, Erikah Lyons and Ratzlaff — all freshmen — finished 14th in preliminaries.
Josiah Witteman competed in the high jump, but did not clear the minimum height, 5’8”.
The Cubs’ 4×400-meter relay team of Isaac, Justin Meins, Anthony Doran and Ethan Bartlett also assured themselves of a medal by placing seventh in Friday’s prelims with a mark of 3:32.08.
Joe Kline took 10th in the 3200-meter run, finishing in 10:45.71.
Britnee Works finished 15th in the girls high jump, clearing 4’8”.
Isaac competed in the 200 meters, but did not qualify for finals with his mark of 24.18 seconds.
Likewise, Ethan Bartlett finished just short of qualifying in the 400 meters, finishing in 53.05 seconds.
Justin Meins and Kyle Doolittle both ran in the 300-meter intermediate hurdles, finishing in 44.12 and 45.65 seconds, but neither advanced to finals.
Hamm, last year’s Class 2A boys high jump champ, wound up in a tie for fourth this year, clearing 6 feet.
He qualified in both the 110-meter and 300-meter hurdles races, placing the second fastest qualifying time in both events. He finished the 110 hurdles in 15.55 seconds; the 300 hurdles in 41.57 seconds.
The 300 hurdles qualification was even more remarkable after onlookers noticed he ran the race with one shoe untied.
The Wildcats’ Makayla Jones took home fifth place in the girls discus. Her final throw of the day, 109’2” pushed her from ninth to fifth.
Levi Cooper came agonizingly close to qualifying in the 200-meter dash, finishing in 23.67 seconds, .02 seconds slower than the final qualifying mark.
Brett Holloway also finished just out of the medals with his ninth-place finish in the 3200 meters, finishing in 10:18.03.
Jones took 12th in the shot put, with a mark of 32’5”.
Crest High’s Rene Rodriguez also narrowly missed out on a medal, when he finished ninth in the 200-meter-dash prelims. Rodriguez finished in 23.85 seconds, a tenth of a second slower than Burrton’s Brandon Thomas, who secured the eighth and last spot in the finals.
Rodriguez still has a chance to medal today when he competes in the 100-meter dash.
Living on the edge at state
