While Iola High’s junior varsity track athletes competed against primarily smaller schools Tuesday at the Gene Farrow Invitational — an event hosted by Waverly High School and held at Iola’s Riverside Park — the quality of the competition made it a tough event for all, Mustang head coach David Daugharthy said.
“Our JV athletes competed well and fought hard,” Daugharthy said. “The effort they put forth, I couldn’t be more proud of.”
Highlighting Iola’s day was Keysha Smith, who placed seventh in the 100-meter hurdles with a time of 17.93 seconds. “This was the first time she ran a good race after dealing with an injury at the start of the season,” Daugharthy said. “As a freshman, this is a great start for her.”
Mustang sophomore Bethany Miller took fifth in the discus with a personal best throw of 89 feet, 1 inch, and took sixth in the shot put with a mark of 31’4.5”. “We are very excited to see her continue to develop,” Daugharthy said.
On the boys side, Iola’s Cole Moyer, like all other runners, had to contend with wind tunnel-like conditions on the track. He took seventh in the 800-meter run with a time of 2 minutes, 25.46 seconds. “He ran a very tough race,” Daugharthy said.
Several other youngsters recorded personal-best marks: Rohan Springer in the shot put; Griffin Westervelt in the 100-meter dash, Mahala Burris in the high jump, Estella DeClara in the 400-meter dash, Abby Jerome in both the 100-meter dash and javelin, and Ari Ramirez in the 100-meter hurdles.
Tuesday’s track meet included a power outage that disrupted times and distance recordings for assorted events.
Most of the times and distances were reported in Thursday’s Register. Organizers provided an addendum of distances for some athletes in both the shot put and discus throws, although they acknowledged the list may still be incomplete.
Here’s the addendum for the area schools:
Iola
Bethany Miller, fifth in discus at 89’1; sixth in shot put at 31’4.5”
Alex Donnell, 30’5.5” in the shot put
Rohan Springer, 25’2.5” in the shot put
Marmaton Valley
Mason Ferguson, 30’7” in the shot put
