5 Star Conference Freshman Sophmore Meet
- Complete Results & Coverage
- Photo Album by Ralph Epifanio (504 Photos)
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In track, there’s an expression that fits most competitive situations quite nicely; “If you can’t run with the big dogs, stay on the porch.” What it means, basically, is that pups need not try. But what if you’re not a canine at all, but rather another carnivore altogether?
Wedged in between big-name invitational meets and end-of-season championships, the annual round of freshman/sophomore meets might seem like a chance for “pups”—if you will—to put on a good show, and maybe medal…maybe. However, the winning performances of several of this particular meet’s participants rank among the best in Florida. Taking their high school grade into consideration, those performances become all the more remarkable. While observing the proceedings, it seemed to me that what I was witnessing was a few full-grown, sharp-fanged, and long-clawed cats—particularly of the Family Felidae (roaring, or great cats)--enjoying all that puppy-chow.
Take, for example, Charles Nelson of Seabreeze. A leopard can’t hide its spots, and while his self-assured, I-just-swallowed-something-tasty smirk has you involuntarily backing away, you can never adequately imagine just how easy—or how efficient--it would be for him to “leap” into action.
The leopard (Panthera pardus) is a sub-Saharan, opportunistic hunter, with relatively short legs, a long body, and large skull, is adaptable to almost any habitat. It can run speeds up to 36 MPH, leap 20 feet horizontally, and nearly ten vertically.
To me, that sounds pretty much like a description of Charles. In individual events, Nelson won the long jump (23’9”), the triple jump (44’2”), and came in second in the 100—to Creek’s Xavier “the cheetah” Atkins—but more on that later. And then there was the 4 X 1, where he anchored a team of two other sprinters, and one shot putter, to beat the best the Conference had to offer, winning in 46.04.
“It’s my sixth year of track,” he told me. “I started in the fourth grade, with the Daytona Beach Supersonics, an AAU track club. I did the 100, the 200, and the 4 X 1.”
And honed his horizontal leaping ability. In this meet, he used his leopard-like legs to land—after being aloft for 23’9”—further into that big sandbox than any other cat out there.
“He’s an unbelievable kid,” said his coach, Walter McCoy. “He missed a 24 by going over the line by a centimeter. He jussssst crossed that line.”
“That was my best jump for last year, and this year,” continued Nelson. “My furthest before that was 23’6-½” at the State Meet.” (He placed first in the 3A, on May 6, 2011.)
But there was more to come.
“Today I switched the 200 for the triple jump. This was my first time doing it.”
Mc Coy fills us in.
“He had never done the triple jump before, so I said, ‘Just try it.’ He said, ‘Hey coach, I’ve never done this.’ I said, ‘Just do a couple of run-throughs.’ ‘Man, coach, I don’t want to do this!’ Meanwhile, I signed him up for it.”
The result was a 44’2” effort. Four more feet--48’ 5”--would have won the 3A Meet in 2011.
“For the first time, I’m pretty pleased…but there’s room for improvement.”
“I think, in a few more tries, he can get up to at least a 47,” suggested an enthusiastic McCoy.
Charles also plays football.
“I start at free safety, and switch--in every series--at running back…I’ve been in that (football) since fourth grade.”
His current project is combining the best of football, with the best of track.
“I like being part of the team, and helping out wherever I can, like in practice. I’ve got some people, from my school, who want to beat me. I like good competition.”
For example?
“Josh Stevens. He does all the things I do: the 100 (third in this meet, in 11.72), 200, 4 X 1, long jump (third with 19’), and triple jump (eighth with 37’).
“And there’s Dorian Gonzalez. He does the shot put (second with 41’3”) and discus (second with 107’ 7-1/2”). Today, he (Dorian) ran the 4 X 1 with us because we don’t have any more freshmen and sophomores. We don’t have as many running kids (on the team), and they’re not always faster, but whoever comes out gives it all we can ask.”
“A shot putter who had never done a relay,” explained Coach McCoy. “That was their first time together…even doing a handoff.”
And after a quick run-through, the Seabreeze foursome turned a quicker 400, winning in 46.04.
“We’re, like, real close friends, so we push each other a lot. I encouraged Dorian to come out for track, and he encouraged me to do weight lifting. It’s helped make me a lot stronger, and given me more speed.”
As the meet went on, it became obvious that this was a special group of cats—I mean kids—and that more surprises were to come.
When lined up at the start of the sprints, events which are generally dominated by football players, Spruce Creek’s Xavier Atkins seems almost out of place. His long graceful limbs and a sharp, penetrating stare remind us of a single cheetah standing in the middle of a line of lions.
The cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus), with its long legs, thin waist, small head and narrow eyes, is the most graceful of all big cats. Through large nostrils pour in prodigious amounts of air, and inside that streamlined body is an enlarged heart and lungs--which take as many as 150 breaths per minute when going full throttle--to efficiently feed its legs prodigious amount of oxygen, allowing it to accelerate from 0 to 62 in three seconds. Capable of reaching a top speed of nearly 75 MPH, it is the fastest land animal on earth.
Xavier Atkins might “only” be a freshman, but he has been posting times that belie his limited high school experience, and for good reason.
“I’ve been running for eight years,” he explained. “Before this, I ran with the Daytona Beach Supersonics. I’ve done the 100 (10.73 PR), the 200 (21.26 best), and the 400 (51.13).”
Unlike most sprinters, who frequently run track to build speed for football, he is content with being a runner.
“Only track,” he confirmed.
It would seem that his other focus is academic.
“Academics are always number one while in school. They help you for any sport. To be the best, you have to be a student athlete.”
His favorite subject?
“History. I like reading about the Civil War, and the past presidents. George Washington, for example, and what he did for our country.”
In this meet, he swept all three individual events that he entered; the 100 (10.98), the 200 (21.89), and the 400 (51.13). However, he sees his role on the Spruce Creek team beyond that of earning individual points.
“I try every day to become more of a team person. A lot of people say it’s an individual sport, but it’s all about team; pushing each other.”
The more you push, the more you pull. And Atkins pushed himself into winning the toughest triple in track, the 100, 200, and 400. What he hopes will come next is even tougher.
“I would like to try to run the times of Xavier Carter, an Olympian and a professional runner, at a faster pace than he did while still in high school.”
Now that is a tall order. Carter, for those few uninitiated, won FHSAA state titles for Palm Bay High School in the 100, 200, and 400 in 2003 and 2004—topping out at 10.29, 20.49, and 45.44--before going on to star in track and football at LSU. He was the first high school athlete to run under 21 in the 200, was the National High School record holder in the 200, and a two-time USA Track and Field Athlete of the year (2003 and 2004).
To his credit, Atkins wants to add yet another X to his list of goals.
“I want to make the 2016 Olympic team.”
Do they even allow cheetahs to compete?
DeLand’s Keneth Pineiro isn’t the fastest runner on the track, but he can keep it up longer than anyone else, not unlike a certain racecar named after yet another member of the genus Panthera.
The jaguar (Panthera onca) is a compact, well-muscled animal, and the only great cat indigenous to the Americas. It was so well-known to Native Americans as to be the subject of prehistoric art work. An apex predator, it has a particularly nasty way of subduing its prey; by attacking from behind and biting down on its head in between the victim’s ears--and through its skull--sinking its teeth into the brain. Ouch!
No wonder lapped runners don’t have to be reminded to vacate the inside lane—and maybe two or three more as a “cushion”—when they hear Pineiro coming up behind them. In his part of Florida, this sophomore is in a “class by himself.” That has yet to limit his enthusiasm. With a goal to get faster, quicker than anyone could have imagined, he seems to set PRs every time he sets foot on the Deltona track. (Could it be because, despite his running for DeLand, it is his “home” track?)
“I really like pushing myself in every meet,” he explained. “Sometimes I do good, sometimes not as good as I’d like to. But I still push myself.”
In his first race of the meet, the opening 4 X 8, he turned in a heroic 2:05 anchor leg. Entirely due to his efforts, his team’s overall time, 9:16.52, was just barely enough to supplant FPC (9:17.95), which had been coasting to second behind Spruce Creek (9:04.89). With a little more track, would even SC been safe?
Next up was the 1600.
“I was on pace for a much better time. My coaches kept telling me my splits were on target for a 4:23 or so, but when I finished, I was timed in 4:30(.91).”
Still, in the metric mile the lapmeister picked off a number of runners from other schools…and still more in the 3200. In the longer race, his final time (9:46.34) was only hundredths of a second off his PR (9:46.09), set on the same track ten days earlier. Plus, that twin win is his second in two tries, all PR (for the time) efforts. (Is there a junior meet?)
“I love the mile, but I’m pretty good at longer distances. I like the two mile, but it hurts,” he said with a wry smile. “I just need to work harder. If I can PR by myself, when there’s competition I can PR by even more.”
The tiger (Panther tigris), which includes nine subspecies, once ranged throughout Asia, but their population has been greatly diminished. With an overall length of 11 feet (excluding tail), a gross weight of 650+ pounds, 3 ½” canine teeth, and a horizontal leap of ten meters, they pretty much eat whatever they want …including an occasional runner. Yikes!
With all that to consider, why would a school with team colors of black and orange choose any other mascot? Go figure. At least they have the jumping part right. In this meet, Creek amassed a whopping 220.6 points (99.5 Boys, 121.1 Girls)—or 69% of their total points—in events involving jumps. (Was that Coach Shere Khan that I saw lurking in the shadows?)
Spruce Creek’s Anthony Greggo won both hurdles events, Jessica Walley captured the 100s, Jack Ransom and Courtney Belgrade won their respective high jumps, Kristen Gaines won the pole vault, and Courtney also won the triple jump.
So I asked Anthony, “What do you have in your gas tank, Tiger?*
“I just don’t like to lose,” he admitted. “I give it my all.”
Part of his key to success, is, well, failure.
“I hit the hurdles a lot,” he admitted, “especially in the 110s, and I struggle a lot, but I’ve been taught that 2nd place is ‘first loser,’ and I just don’t like to lose.”
But life is rarely perfect. Although Greggo won the both hurdles, his coach approached him with a little “favor.”
“I usually run the 4 X8, but they wanted me to do the open 800.”
He was third (in 2:11.22), behind Marcus Bullard (Seabreeze; 2:08.13) and Conor Reed (Orange City; 2:09.12).
Leading a Spruce Creek sweep of the first three places in the Girls’ 800 was Paxton Shamlou. I caught up to her as she crossed the finish line.
“I ran three events today,” she said, trying to catch her breath. “The 4 X 8,” won by Creek in 9:04.89, “the mile”—she was third in 5:49.71—“and open 800.
“I actually hadn’t warmed up for this”—the open 8—“at all. Originally, they said I was going to run it, but was never entered. Then I got in, but got there just before the gun went off. I guess, with all the adrenalin, and with Coach Gallon yelling out my individual lap times, it really helped me out.”
With all the excitement, she was just a tad off her best, 2:29.61 at the April 4, 2011 4A District 2 meet , but still a Freshman/Sophomore Champion.
“In the first lap I tried to stay ahead, and in the second ‘just let it happen.’ I was so full of adrenalin.”
A similar logic—to ‘just let it happen,’ might have occurred to pole vaulter Colton Boyd of Flagler-Palm Coast High School. At 11’ 0”, he was the last one in the competition, and decided to up it by a full foot, to 12-0.
“His best is 12-6, at Father Lopez,” explained his coach, David Halliday. “Lately, he’s been struggling with 11 and 11-6. So he went up to 12, which was perfectly all right with me. Why mess around with something that he had already cleared? And he had already won at 11, so why not go up? Why waste a jump? In the pole vault and high jump, you do that; jump it up.”
He missed all three attempts at 12.
Kia Pooler (Orange City) suffered a similar fate in the high jump, but it came with a cost. In every meet this year she has cleared 5’0”; no more no less. However, along the way, she has had moments where she has seemed plagued with a lack of concentration. As the bar crept up, she might miss a height, then make it. Like clockwork, she would clear everything up to and including 5-0, then miss three times at 5-2.
In this meet, three were tied at 4-8, and that was it. Courtney Belgrade got the win on fewer misses, but Pooler’s miss cost her, and she finished in second with the same height.
“I guess I was kind of laid back,” Kia said afterwards. “I wanted to do really well, but there wasn’t any competition in this.”
She ended her first 5 Star meet with a second in the high jump, a sixth in the 200 (27.66), a fourth in the 100 meter hurdles (18.10), and—her lone first—a ¼ share in the 4 X 1 title.
New to the area, but not to track, was freshman Devonne Friday, who is attending Flagler-Palm Coast High School.
If snow birds head north in Spring, what heads south. Snow leopards maybe?
“I just moved here, three months ago, from Pennsylvania—south of Philly—near Glenwood-Chichester,” she explained. “I ran track in 8th grade; the 100, the 200, and the 4 X 1. I’m a sprinter. I just tried this”—the hurdles—“this year. I guess success helps.
“I do the 100 and 300 hurdles. I think I got second overall in the 100s (17.28). I don’t like them as much. I like the 300, because they are more spread out.”
Her first place time in that was 49.24.
Like many of the more talented athletes, Seabreeze’s Alexia Johnson entered the meet with a full plate. I spoke to her after her winning effort—16’2-1/2”—in the long jump.
I did the long jump, and the 100,” she said. “(In the 100) I got second. We”--she and the winner, Colubiale—“both got 3.15, but she won by, I think, a thousandth. Right now, I’m trying to focus on the 200. I didn’t get to run it last year. I got hurt in the 100, and the 200 was right after that. This year, I was in the first flight of the long jump, and it ended quickly, then the first heat of the 100; there’s no finals today.”
Alexia finished fourth in the 200, with a time of 27.28.
Team Scoring
In taking first in nine of 17 events for the Boys, and 12 of 17 for the Girls—not to mention dozens of seconds, thirds, etc.--it was Spruce Creek by a landslide: 251.16 points for the Boys and 246 for the Girls.
Leading their parade of firsts were double winners Krista Colubiale in the sprints (13.15 and 26.59), Anthony Greggo in the hurdles (17.36 in the 110s and 43.83 in the 300s), Courtney Belgrade in the high jump (4’8”) and triple jump (32’8-½”), and Keith Narozny in the weights (43’9” in the shot and 112’10” in the discus). In addition, Jessica Walley won in the highs (17.10), Jack Ransom (5’8”) and Courtney Belgrade (4’8”) in the high jump, Kristen Gaines in the pole vault (9’0”), Kristina Harris in the 400 (59.82), Paxton Shamlou in the 800 (2:32.25), Monet Bartell led a SC sweep of the mile (5:45.92), and Sydney Volenec won the 3200 (12:43.56).
In relays, the Boys won the 4 X 8 (9:04.89) and the Girls the 4 X 4 (4:11.13) and 4 X 8 (10:29.96).
*Once upon a time, Esso, the gasoline company, was our friend. For example, ack in the 60s, even though gas was only 29.9 cents a gallon, guys in clean uniforms pumped your gas, cleaned your windshield, checked the oil, and took your money (hurrying back with your change). About this time, this petroleum company also created the most popular advertising campaign in history by giving out, literally, millions of 6” tiger tails to stick under the gas flap of your car. (Doing so, showed the world that “I have a tiger in my tank!”) I wish I still had mine. They’re going for upwards of $19.99 on e-Bay! Alas, Esso has since become Exxon, the company launched the infamous supertanker Valdez (Commercial shipping’s version of the Titanic), and “service stations” replaced repair bays with “convenience stores.” Need I mention the price of gas?