Wilmington Finds Success at State Meet

OMISSION: In the original story, Eli Jennings' results in the shot put were not included. Jennings earned a fourth place finish and a berth in the All-State meet as he threw for an impressive distance of 49 feet, 9.75 inches, which was tied for the third best distance in the competition.

The Wilmington boys and girls track teams concluded a successful season on Friday night during the Division 3 state meet in Boston.

For the Lady Wildcats, the 4x400 team led the way with a 4th place finish in a PR of 4:12.7. This is the fastest time for a 4x400 team in a number of years, according to head coach Thom Bradley.

Alex Bischoff, Rachel Alatalo, Kelly Hartsough and Cali Peffer finished a great season with this effort and received medals and also were recognized as Middlesex League All-Stars.

Senior Nichole Lunt threw 30' 7" in the shot put, closing out a stellar career at Wilmington. Savannah Hubbard ran 9.97 in the 55-meter hurdles, coming off an injury.

Cali Peffer ran 44.30 in the 300-meter dash and Alex Bischoff ran 45.03.

"They were a great one-two punch all season long," said Bradley.

Rachel Alatalo had a solid time of 1:43.80 in the 600-meter run, Kelly Hartsough ran a personal record of 3:08 in the 1,000-meter run to take eighth place and a medal and Sydnee Russo had a PR of 5:45.4 in the mile to finish the season very strong.

For the boys, Steve Halas had the best finish of the day individually. Halas darted to a time of 1:25.65 in the 600-meter run, which earned him a fourth place result.

Eric Jaeschke ran the 300-meter dash in 40.04 seconds and David Swider was 10th in the 1,000-meter run with a time of 2:42.

The 4x400 relay team of Pat Barry, Andrew Fino, Colin Chase and Jaeschke combined for a time of 3:41.19, which helped the team to crack the top ten and snag ninth place.

Then the 4x800 team of Erik Alatalo, Andrew Sears, Swider and Steve Halas ran to a time of 8:32.22, which was good for an impressive sixth place finish.

Overall, the Lady Wildcats were 23rd out of 36 teams with six points and the boys posted 13 points and ended the day in 14th out of 34 teams.