Giants Track & Field Off To Strong Start

The 2017 Track & Field season got started for Highland Park with a meet at Glenbrook North High School. The team saw improvement across the board from last year at this same meet.

Sprints:

Going into the season the coaching staff had concerns about what kind of depth we would have in the sprints. This meet started to show that the team’s speed is better than expected. In the 50 Meter Dash, HP came out strong with impressive runs by junior Michael Menaker and senior Ben Davis. They both finished in 6.3. Just behind them was newcomer junior Ryan Brinks in 6.4.

The 4X1 Lap Relay had an exciting race. Senior Keith Greenwood led off and got the baton to junior Luke Crawford. They both battled hard, but the team was behind and looked to be out of contention. Davis got the baton on the third leg and ran great to close on the leader. Menaker was the anchor leg and ran with tenacity to get the lead and battle to the line with a final time of 1:20.5.

In the 200 Meter Run, Menaker ran another fast race with a 24.4! Davis was not far behind in 24.8. Junior Justin Illes was impressive in his first season on the team running a 25.8. Next in was Brinks at 26.3.

The HP 400 Meter Dash runners were led by senior Ari Weisenthal with a :58.4 and Illes with a :59.2.

Each season the team is looking for athletes to put together strong 4X400 Meter Relays. Last year at this meet the team had only one guy under :59 and two more guys under 1:00. This season the Giants had one guy under :58 and five more guys under :59! The times are not great at this point, but they show the team has something to work with and will be able to put together a strong 4X400 this season. The fastest relay was junior Ben Zavell (:58.8), Weisenthal (:58.6), senior Jonathan Rosenfeld (:58.3), and senior Zev Motew (:57.8). Two others that went sub 60 were sophomore Jakob French (:58.0) and junior Andrew Derdena (:58.5). Distance runner, Junior Alec Glazier also ran well as he just missed going under with a 1:00.2.

Hurdles:

The team has a nice group of hurdlers that have been working very hard. They were led by Motew (8.1 55 Meter HH, 7.9 55 Meter LH). Senior Nick Kirsch returned to the hurdles this season after focusing just on the jumps last season. He ran well in both races (8.8 55 Meter HH, 8.2 55 Meter LH). Sophomore Joseph Beaudet was a full second ahead of last year at this meet in the LH with an 8.8. The team has two freshmen hurdlers that are showing great promise. Eduardo Monk (9.9 55 Meter HH, 9.6 55 Meter LH) and Maxwell Kaplan (11.0 55 Meter HH, 10.7 55 Meter LH).    

Distance:

The team only had three runners in the 800 Meter Run and all of them improved on their times from last year. Seniors Josh Drummond (2:16.5 to 2:14.9) and Ethan Small (2:30.4 to 2:26.7) each improved by a few seconds.  Sophomore Andrew Biondi had a huge improvement of 2:45.1 to 2:35.4.

All of the HP runners in the 1600 Meter Run improved on their times from the timed mile run earlier in the season. Junior Nate Amster led the way with a strong and confident race to finish in 4:42.3. Two other runners finished under 4:50 with senior Jonathan Rosenfeld in 4:46.3 and junior Alec Glazier in 4:49.5. Senior Ben Bloom had a good race after recovering from mono earlier this winter as he ran 5:01.5. Senior Hayden Schott ran a 5:24.0 last year at this meet and through hard work over the past year dropped his time to 5:08.0. Other highlights in this race included a very strong race by freshmen Ryan Rosenfeld to finish in 5:22.7. Also, sophomore Ben Gordon ran a huge PR going under 7 for the first time with a 6:35.0.

Field Events:

The field events are always a crucial part of a team’s success as these are the events that get a team’s scoring and momentum started. The performances in these events showed much improvement from what these athletes were able to do at this meet last season.

Nick Kirsch improved in both the horizontal jumps. In the Triple Jump he got a mark of 36’6” while he went 18’3” in the Long Jump. Crawford showed nice improvement from last year as he went 16’9” compared to 15’11” last year. Brinks showed his athleticism with a 17’9.75” Long Jump mark.

Both HP High Jump competitors tied their personal best jumps. Senior Keith Greenwood and sophomore Jack Casey cleared 5’4”.

Zavell worked very hard on his vaulting during the off-season and it showed in this first meet. He cleared 11’0” while last year he only got 8’0” in the Pole Vault. Sophomore Ben Kirsch went from 8’6” last year at this meet to 10’6” this season.

The coaching staff knew that the throws would be one of our strengths this season and they proved that at GBN. Three throwers were over 40 feet for the first time at this meet over the past years. Junior Zach Auerbach led the way with a 40’10” throw followed by seniors Michal Steczek (40’5”) and Joey Sereda (40’2”). This was the first time Sereda has thrown over 40 feet. Newcomers, sophomores Kevin Kaufmann and Will Pfeffer, were both over 30 feet (36’6” and 30’7”).  

This was a quality start to the season for the Giants! The 2017 team has a very positive and determined atmosphere. The coaches are really excited to see what successes this team’s hard work will bring throughout the rest of the season.