Solid Results For Greenwich Track Team At Class LL Championship

The following Greenwich High School Track Team round up from last week's State Class LL Championship meet is by Coach Jeff Klein:

On the strength of four scoring efforts the team ended up with 16 points at the LL meet in New Britian. In addition to these achievements, there were a number of strong performances from our athletes as they competed very well against athletes from around the state.

Continuing his post season success, Oliver Fulton placed third in the 300 meter hurdles in a time of 41.12. It was just off his PB set at last week's FCIAC meet. Fulton hit the first two hurdles but righted himself nicely to finish about a half second behind the winner. Fulton will continue his season on Monday at the State Open against the best hurldlers in the state where he will have the opportunity to compete for a top 6 place and a chance to reach the New England Championships.

Senior Captain George Karakadas has been a mainstay of the team for his four years at GHS. In the 800 he improved on last year's 6th place finish at the LL meet to take 4th place. His time of 1:57.12 was a 1.6 second improvement from his PB set earlier this season. That was 2 seconds off the school record in the 800, that was set 38 years ago. As with Fulton, Karakadas earned a spot in Monday's State Open with his oustanding effort.

Our final individual scorer was captain Charlie Ducret in the 200. Running into a headwind, he recorded an excellent time of 23.25 as he ended up in 8th place to earn a team point. He was .005 seconds off of 7th and .13 behind 5th place, just missing the automatic qualification into the State Open.

The final scoring for GHS was a terrific team effort in the last track event of the day, the 4 X 400 meter relay. As he did last week, Ducret handled the first leg and put the Cardinals slightly into the lead with his fastest ever split of 51.20. Fulton was next with a 52.5 effort followed by Karakadas also in the 52's for his leg. Zane Nye handled the heavy lifting on the anchor leg as we were neck and neck with Shelton for the 5th and final automatic qualifying spot for the State Open. With an outstanding leg, Nye held off the runner from Shelton by .14 seconds to help the relay earn the trip back to New Britian and the State Open on Monday. His split was 51.5 bringing the team home in their fastest time this season of 3:27.

There were several other notable efforts by GHS athletes. In his final competition for the Cardinals, Senior Captain Paul Agresta reached the finals of the javelin, with his second best throw ever of 147 feet 6 inches. He was in the final scoring spot until the last throw when he was surpassed by a foot by another competitor as he ended up in 9th place.

Also just missing a scoring chance was Nye in the 100. He ran well in the 100 meters clocking 11.42 into a headwind. The last qualifier for the finals was also in at 11.42 but ended up .004 ahead of Nye. While he missed making the finals where he would have had a good chance to place well, it was an excellent effort by the freshman. At last week's FCIAC meet he ended up in 6th place. Indicative of this week's effort, he beat all 5 FCIAC athletes who were ahead of him last week as he was the league's top finisher at the LL meet!

In additon to our season best peformance in the 4 x 400 relay, our other 2 relays also achieved our best times this spring. In the 4 X 800 we clocked 8:35 as all four athletes had either PB splits or near PB splits. The team included Thomas Rouffiac, Aidan Brock, Akash Molekudy and Alexander Bein. Bein joined as a late replacement for a teammate who was sick and while usually a longer distance runner, stepped up ably to record a 6 second PB! Rouffiac also had a significant PB as he recorded a 2:05 leadoff leg. They ended up in 10th place overall in the event.

Our 4 X 100 team also competed very well as they ran their fastest time of the year by .45 seconds, a significant improvement in this all-out sprint relay. Fulton, Nye, Ducret and Ryan Raybuck placed 10th in 44.10 seconds. In individual events, Anthony Hill ran well in the 110 meter hurdles just missing his all time best time despite running into a headwind. He finished in 12th place. Our outstanding jumper, Owen Bianchi, ended up in 10th in the Triple Jump and 19th in the long jump. Senior thrower Tyler Blizzard was 15th in the shot put and 18th in the javelin. Fellow senior Ben Frey placed 18th in the discus. And Raybuck closed out his season placing 34th in the 100 meters.

As noted we will be back in New Britian for the State Open on Monday to compete against teams from all classes. Fulton, Karakadas and the 4 x 400 relay will take a shot to qualify for the New England championships. We also expect several athletes to compete at the State Steeplchase championships the following week in New Britian. Based on the results from the Class LL meet, we will have a sprint medley relay competing at the National championships in North Carolina in mid-June! Nye has qualified to the run the freshman 100 in that meet as well.

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