4-20-13
The North Yarmouth Academy Panthers took to the track for the first time this season at Hebron Academy for a MAISAD competition. NYA, Seacoast Christian, Hyde, and Hebron competed in the 4 team meet. It was in the 50s and windy but the sun came through on occasion so that the conditions were favorable for a meet at this point in the spring. As a team the boys finished 3rd with 53 points behind Hyde (88 pts) and Hebron (80pts). On the girls side NYA won the meet with 74 points ahead of runner-up Hyde who posted 59 points. Individually there were many MANY strong performances from our athletes.
In the sprints the girl’s team dominated the competition. Emily Baker ’16 won the 100 and finished 2nd in the 200 to lead the way for the Panthers in her first ever track competition. Her time of 13.9h in the 100m also provisionally qualified her for the state meet (for a list of all current state qualifiers click here). Sonia Lin ’16 was next up for the girls finishing 3rd in the 200m and 2nd in the 400m. McKenzie Larson ’14 placed in both of her sprint events as well as she gathered up a 3rd place finish in the 100m and a 5th place in the 200m. The final point scorers for the girls in the sprints were Soh Jeon ’14 Shanna Gu ’13 who placed 4th and 5th respectively in the 100m. Morganne Elkins ’16 made her track debut in both the 100m and 200m on Saturday and the improvement just between the two events was fantastic. On the boys side Dean Walters ’13 ran a strong time in his first ever outdoor competition in the 100m finishing in a state qualifying time of 11.8h which was good for 4th while Michael McIntosh ’14 finished in 5th. El Tayeb Dahia ’14 improved by .2 seconds off of his PR from last least season as well. In the 200m Michael McIntosh led the way for NYA finishing in an automatic qualifying time of 24.1h which was good for 2nd place. Close behind him was Dean Walters ’13 who earned 3rd place and also qualified (provisionally) for the state meet. Ibrahim Al Musawi ’15 dropped a huge .4 seconds off of his time from the indoor season in the same event. In the 400m El Tayeb was just nipped at the finish to place 2nd.
In the throws 2 girls threw the Javelin for the first time to try and help out the team with Kate Hilscher ’16 almost placing for the team! For the boys Clayton Manchester ’15 had an unbelievable, unheard of improvement in the Javelin throwing 120′ which is almost a 30′ PR and good enough for 5th place. In the Discus Kayla Rose ’14 and Muriel Adams ’15 went 2-3 for the team. On the boys side Clayton Manchester had the only PR of the day with a 5′ improvement. In the shotput Kayla Rose finished 2nd in her first ever competition as a “spinner”. All of the boys competitors hit PRs on Saturday as Chase Gendron ’15 threw over 4′ farther than last year to hit 35’11” which was good for 5th place while Aaron Guiseley ’13 threw a PR by almost 1′. Edward Elliot ’13 also tried the event for the first time after 1 day of practice and had a strong first effort.
In the jumps there were many athletes new to their respective events but the results were predictive of a strong future. In the pole vault all of the competitors were first time vaulters and had great days. Linnea Hull ’16 cleared 5’6″ which was good for 2nd place and a spot on the NYA top 5 all-time record board. Duncan George ’15 cleared 5’6″ good for 5th while Clayton lead the way for NYA vaulting 6’6″ which was good enough for 4th place. In the long jump Jin Yao ’14 led the way for NYA with a 16’4″ jump which earned a 3rd place finish. On the girls side Linnea waited until the very end of the competition to put a strong jump together but it paid off with a 4th place finish. Charlotte Eisenburg ’15 tried the event for the first time and steadily improved her distances on each of her 4 attempts while maintaining a perfect mark on the board. In the triple jump Jake Burns ’13 was only a foot under his career best to finish in 4th place while Jin Yao tried the event successfully for the first time. Chase Gendron was NYA’s lone competitor in the High Jump and represented well with a clearance at 5′ which was good for 2nd place.
In the hurdles Jake Burns ’13 won the 300m hurdles in extraordinary fashion with an automatic state qualifying time of 44.6. Jillian Bjorn-Caron finished 3rd for the girls team in a time of 58 seconds which was good for 3rd. In the 110m hurdles Jake ran a career best time of 16.8h to finish 2nd and lower his all-time performance on the record board. Sonia Lin led the way for the girls in a time of 19.4h which is a provisional qualifying time for the state meet and was good for 4th place while Jillian Bjorn-Caron was right on her heals in 19.6h which was good for 5th and also a state qualifying time.
The distance events started off with the 1500m run as Duncan George ’15 led the way for the boys in a time of 4:47 which was good for 4th place. On the girls side Hannah Austin ’15 finished the race in 5:32 (a drop of 44 seconds over last year!) which was good for 4th place on the all-time list and 2nd in the meet. Charlotte tried her first ever race on the track at this distance and was able to finish in 6:27 which was good for 5th place. In the 3000m John LeBlanc ’15 was the sole competitor for the boys and placed 4th in the competition while Hannah Austin ran a 12 second career best to finish in 2nd but also earn a 2nd place spot on the top 5 all-time list. In the 800m Matt Malcom ’15 made his track debut and finished 5th in the event while Andy Liu ran his first ever 800m. On the girls side both Kate Hilscher and Ellis were able to place in the event earning 3rd and 4th respectively.
The 4x100m relays teams for NYA both finished in 2nd place, while the 4x400m relays both grabbed a first place finish by a decisive margin.
Overall a VERY strong first effort. The captains awarded the girls’ Golden Shoe to Sonia Lin for her extraordinary efforts in ALL of her events after only a few weeks of practice and the boys’ Shoe to Duncan George for his performance in the vault, his courage in the 1500m and his selfless valliant effort stepping into the 4x400m relay at the last second to help them win the event. The Panthers will be back in action next Friday at Sacopee Valley and then on Saturday at Hyde.