Harbor League Pelims and City Finals
10 May 2004 - 14 May 2004

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Senior Katherine Wingert went into the Harbor League finals last week as the reigning champion for the 800, 1600 and 3200 meter runs (basically distances of a half mile, mile and two mile). This wasn’t anything new for her as she’s won these three events at the league championship for three years in a row. This year was different as contention was strong from Clairemont’s Judy Jimenez and Crawford’s Nyamouch Choul in the 1600 and 3200. In the 800 Clairemont’s Bridie McCarey had bested her in an earlier meet and teammate Beth Wittry had moved up from the 400 to the 800. The final for the 3200 was on Tuesday followed by a preliminary heat of the 800. Finals for both the 800 and 1600 were on Friday. For the first 6 laps of the 3200 Wingert and Jimenez traded the lead with Choul content to sit back in the third spot. Wingert took over for good on the 8th lap and Choul caught Jimenez in the finish stretch. Katherine’s time of 11:47.5 was a PR by nearly 12 seconds. She needed it as Choul and Jimenez clocked 11:53 and 11:54. McCarey and Wittry qualified for the 800 finals in heat 1 of the prelims with times of 2:30 and 2:35. Wingert went for time in heat 2 and clocked 2:21.3 to Choul’s 2:34.3. Choul took the early lead in Friday’s 1600 final going through the 400 in 72 seconds and the 800 in 2:35. The fast early pace took its toll in the last two laps as Wingert took over for good with 500 meters remaining to win in 5:17.6 to Choul’s 5:19.2. Jimenez was a distant 3rd with 5:32.4. The 800 meter final saw McCarey take the early lead for the first 300 meters. After that it was all Katherine as she sped to a PR of 2:18.42. Again, she needed a PR as teammate Wittry passed McCarey on the final turn to place 2nd in 2:20.23 to McCarey’s 2:22.13. Jake Ruzevick duplicated Wingert’s triple with times of 9:56.6 for the 3200, 4:38.4 for the 1600 and 1:59.6 for the 800. Unlike Katherine he had no significant competition. Blake Gorey was 3rd in the 3200 in 10:59.2 and Brad Munns 2nd in the 800 with 2:04.3. Reid McLean was also a triple winner with excellent marks in the long jump of 21 feet 7 inches, the 400 meter dash in 50.15 seconds and the 300 meter hurdles in 40.92 seconds. In the high jump Adam Munns, jumping off a sore foot, was content to qualify for CIF prelims by placing 2nd with 5’ 10”, well off his PR of 6-6. Jamie Klages, on the other hand, was in fire. Her 5 foot 4.25 inch winning jump broke the 25 year old school record of 5-4 held by Teta Murphy since 1979. High jump coach Kerry Elders has been working on her approach and it appears she has it down as Elders claims she cleared the bar by 2 inches. Klages also qualified for CIF in the 100 hurdles with a 2nd place finish in 17.42. She holds the school record for that event with a time of 16.30 seconds but hasn’t had time to practice it this year. Freshman Sara Player, jumping off a pulled hip flexor, was unable to qualify in the high jump but got in with a bye at the seeding meeting. However, she did qualify on her own in the 300 hurdles by finishing second in 48.85 and ran a leg on the winning 4x400 relay team along with Wingert, Wittry, and Nila Heurtelou. Their time of 4:08.6 was less than 4 seconds off the school record. Heurtelou also qualified in both the 200 and 400 with times 26.35 and 60.2 and Wittry advanced in the triple jump with a 32 foot 10 inch effort. On Tuesday Danielle Eckert advanced in the pole vault. For the third year in a row Wingert was named the Harbor league female track athlete of the year. This year Ruzevick joined her as the Harbor league male track athlete or the year. It was close as he beat out teammate Reid McLean by a single vote. Notable efforts that didn’t make the CIF prelims were David Zodrow’s 7th and 5th place finishes in the shot (PR of 38’) and disk, Ashley Houston’s 4th place finishes in both the 100 and 300 hurdles, Alexis Castro’s 4th in the shot put and Mike Mitchell’s 8th in the 400 with 54.4.