Rutherford Rams Invitational - Results and Coverage
Photo Album by Rese Ammons (1467 Photos)
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The Rutherford Rams invitational had some great races and a couple of unexpected wins. The weather was almost perfect with temps in the 70s, but the wind played a huge factor for some of the longer distance events.
Bay High School girls, who took home the first place team trophy started out on top in the girls 4x800 relay. After the first lap they already had a huge lead over the rest of the pack. Mosley and Wewahitchka fought back and forth over second and third place. After the second leg of the relay, Wewa had put a significant gap between second and third, but Mosley was not giving in that easily. At the third hand off, Mosley was securely back in second place.
"It was one of our better races," the Mosley team chided in together after the race. The girls added they would like to work toward a time of 11 flat.
Bay High School did not budge an inch. At the start of the last 400 meters, Bay was an entire lap ahead of the field finishing with a time of 10:54. Mosley maintained their second place, but Wewa fell into fourth behind West Gadsen.
Arnold High School took the win in the boys 4x800. They were in lead after first 800 and they maintained that lead for the entire race. Bay High School moved up into second by the second hand off but fell to sixth place by the end of the event.
Swanee kicked it in hard to cross the finish in second place and Fairhope showed some impressive talent in the last 800 moving up two places into fifth place.
Fairhope would again impress in the boys 1600m. The race started with all the boys in a huge pack. Sean Nettles from Arnold inched his way into first place just after the first turn headed into the back straight away.
Sean would remain in first place with Andrew Wyllie from Rutherford right on his heels and Nic Fasanello close behind in third. As the runners started to thin out mid-way through the second lap, Nic Fasanello had moved up into second place, but Sean Nettles was still holding his pace in first place.
At the final lap, it appeared that not only would Sean take the win, but his teammate was also moving up. However, as the runners came around the second turn, Nic Fasanello sprinted into first place and took a significant lead, crossing the finish line three seconds head of Sean Nettles with a time of 4:52.
This was a welcome but surprise win for Nic, whose seed time was 5:05. "It was about five seconds faster than I have ever run before," Nic panted excitedly. Nic added that his plan was to stay in second the whole race due to the higher wind.
"Luckily the guy out in front kept a good pace," Nic added. He also commented his goal is to eventually get down to 4:40. Nic would finish the day on a high, also taking the win in the 3200.
In the girls 1600, Sarah Barwick from Bay high school seemed to lead a very easy, smooth pace for the first two laps. She ran alongside Lindsey Toole from Marianna, but at the start of the final 400, really took off, putting a bit of space between first and second.
Sarah Barwick finished first with a 6:01, seven seconds ahead of Lindsey Toole. Both first and second finished 24 seconds ahead of everyone else.