Ark Valley News - Hornets earn eight medals at state track

Madison Runnion clears the bar in the high jump at the 5A state track meet May 30. Runnion placed second with a jump of 5 feet, 4 inches.

Hornets earn eight medals at state track
By Taylor Messick
Last Updated: June 04, 2015

This year's Class 5A state track and field meet saw mixed results for Valley Center High School. There were a couple of surprises, with a few competitors exceeding individual expectations and placing higher than they were supposed to. On the other hand, a couple of qualifiers also didn't perform as well as they would've hoped and finished a bit lower than expected.

The boys participated in nine events and the girls participated in eight, totaling 17 events that were represented by the Hornets. The magic number was 17, as both the boys' and girls' teams finished in 17th place, overall, at the meet. The girls finished with 16 total points and the boys tied Kapaun with 14 total points.

Valley Center had a tough time scoring points on May 29, the first day of the meet. They finished the day with just one participant finishing in the top eight. On May 30, the contestants picked up the slack and totaled nearly all of the Hornets' points. The team finished the second day with seven more top-eight medals, equaling eight total top-eight finishes in this year's meet.

The top performer of the meet for Valley Center was sophomore Madison Runnion. Runnion competed in the high jump, where she tied for sixth last year as a freshman. This year, Runnion tied her personal record with a leap of 5 feet, 4 inches. The jump was good enough for second place, behind a familiar opponent, four-time state champion and former all-American Jaylyn Agnew, a senior from Andover, who had a jump of 5-6.

"She'll be gone next year," Runnion said. "Next year will hopefully be my turn, but I don't know what will happen. I was hoping to get 5-6 — that was my goal this season — I was really close but didn't quite get it. I was definitely happy with my performance, it really does feel good."

Another spectacular performance, which was a bit of a surprise, came from senior Chandler Summers. After coming in ranked 15th, Summers earned a third-place finish in the 400 meter dash.

"I felt like I could've done better," he said, "but I'm still happy with that finish. Last year I think I got second to last. It just goes to show you that rankings don't really matter, it's just how you perform at the actual meet."

There was a circumstance that presented Summers with some adversity at the meet and affected his potential to finish even higher. Not only did he compete in the 400, but Summers also participated in the long jump, where he finished fifth. It just so happened that these events were taking place at the exact same time, on the exact same day. The long jump was scheduled to take place an hour earlier, but as luck would have it, field events ran behind and Summers' events were going on simultaneously. This meant that after the preliminary rounds of the long jump concluded, Summers had to run over to the other end of the track to check in and run the 400. As soon as Summers earned his third-place finish, he had to run back over to the sand pit and make his final long jumps.

"I still ran a good time after sprinting so many times in the long jump," he said. "Then I ran over there and they had me ready to go. I had no legs left — my legs were done after that. I knew I was going to do worse just because legs matter a lot in long jump. You've got to get that speed and I didn't have any speed after that."

Summers' teammate and good friend, junior DeMarco King, also earned a fifth-place finish in the 100-meter dash and took 13th in the 200. King has been a consistent scorer for the Hornets all season, regularly placing in the top three in both events. However, with a couple of the meet's toughest and most competitive events on his plate, King wasn't necessarily expected to finish as high in the state meet. King defied expectations by improving on his already blazing speed and earning fifth against some of the top athletes in Kansas, and still has one more year of eligibility to improve even more.

"No, he's not running track next year," joked Summers.

"No, no — yes I am. I'll be back," said King with a smile, giving Summers a playful shove.

Sophomore Taylor Latimer placed in the top eight in both of her events at the meet. In just her second year of high school, she continues to impress and establish herself as one of the top throwers in the state. Latimer took sixth in discus and eighth in javelin. Though she earned medals and points in both events, it wasn't the finish she hoped for, particularly in discus.

"The performance wasn't that great for discus," she said. "I expected to do a little better, but at least I placed. All of them in the field ahead of me are juniors and seniors, so next year the talent will probably drop down. But this year has been a pretty good experience. I got personal records a lot of times and I got close to a school record."

The Hornets also got points from the girls' 4x800-meter relay team. The team consisted of freshmen Karli Elsner and Sydney Martens, sophomore Jadyn Eddy and junior Kalee Owens. The girls finished about where they were expected to against a tough field, and they were happy with the results.

"I thought we did good," said Martens. "I think we all ran our hardest and kept kind of the same spot we started off in, so it was good."

This is a group that has changed over the course of the season, as Martens and Eddy were on the soccer team and were only able to attend a couple of meets. The junior, Owens, is the veteran of the group and has been a part of the team for three years.

"Those three are new," she said, "but it's good to have new people in it to get a fresh group so more people are hungry for it."

Owens also competed in the 800 meter run. She was the final Hornet to medal in the meet, taking eighth place. Owens is competitive, and is sure to be back in the mix in both events next year in her final year of high school competition.

KSHSAA state track meet at Cessna Stadium

Wichita

May 29-30

Boys

1. Tecumseh-Shawnee Heights 76.5; 2. Leavenworth 75; 3. Shawnee-Mill Valley 68; 4. Wichita-Bishop Carroll 54; 5. OP-St. Thomas Aquinas 44; 6. OP-Blue Valley West 41; 7. Newton 33; 8. KC-Turner 30; 9. KC-Schlagle 26; 10. Wichita-Heights 25; 11. Liberal 19; 11. Great Bend 19; 13. Topeka-Seaman 18; 14. Andover-Central 16; 14. Lenexa-St. James Academy 16; 16. Goddard-Eisenhower 15; 17. Wichita-Kapaun Mount Carmel 14; 17. Valley Center 14; 19. Ark City 12.5; 20. Lansing 12; 20. Maize South 12; 20. Emporia 12; 23. Andover 11; 24. Pittsburg 9; 25. OP-Blue Valley Southwest 8; 25. Salina-Central 8; 27. Salina South 6; 28. Topeka-West 5.

VC Results

100 — 5. DeMarco King 11.14. 200 — 13. DeMarco King 23.17. 400 — 3. Chandler Summers 50.48. 4x100 — 11. Valley Center (Sowers, King, Summers, White) 44.01. Pole Vault — 16. Tyler Brown 11-06. Long Jump — 5. Chandler Summers 21-06. Triple Jump — 9. Colby Martin 42-06.5. Shot Put — 11. Evan Balthazor 45-08.5. Discus — 9. Mason Orr 136-03.

Girls

1. Lenexa-St. James Academy 82; 2. OP-St. Thomas Aquinas 71.5; 3. Maize South 65; 4. Pittsburg 49; 5. Emporia 43; 5. Newton 43; 7. Lansing 36; 8. OP-Blue Valley West 33; 9. Shawnee-Mill Valley 32; 10. Leavenworth 30; 11. Andover 25; 11. Andover-Central 25; 13. Goddard 21; 14. Wichita-Heights 20; 15. Goddard-Eisenhower 18; 15. Salina-South 18; 17. Valley Center 16; 18. Salina-Central 14; 19. Wichita-Kapaun Mount Carmel 10; 20. Topeka-Seaman 9.5; 21. Topeka-West 8.5; 21. Great Bend 8.5; 23. Liberal 7; 24. Tecumseh-Shawnee Heights 6; 25. OP-Blue Valley Southwest 5; 26. Wichita-Bishop Carroll 4; 27. KC-Shlagle 1.

VC Results

800 — 8. Kalee Owens 2:24.3. 1600 — 10. Karli Elsner 5:37.66. 4x800 — 6. Valley Center (Elsner, Martens, Eddy, Owens) 10:10.33. High Jump — 2. Madison Runnion 5-4. Pole Vault — 11. Julie Chen 9-0. Discus — 6. Taylor Latimer 115-2. Javelin — 8. Taylor Latimer 122-0.