Queen Creek Invitational
April 11, 2008
While some of the top Arizona athletes headed to California for the Arcadia Invitational, a few stayed home to compete in the Queen Creek Invitational on Friday evening and the Sun Angel Classic on Saturday. On the girls side at the Queen Creek Invite, teammates Mariah Bowers (junior) and Ashley Workman (sophomore) of Queen Creek ran the 800 side by side until the final meters where Bowers stepped over the finish line just .09 ahead of Workman with a time of 2:22.03.
On the boys side D.J. Johnson (Jr. Mesa Mt. View pictured right) had a slight lead in the mile for three laps until he shifted into another gear and gained a five second lead at the finish line with a time of 4:22.86. Kevin Rayes, a junior at Arcadia, came in second at 4:27.40. The 3200 was a three way race with Sherod Hardt (sophomore, Queen Creek pictured below right), Derek Brienholt (senior, Highland below center) and Brian Shrader (sophomore, Sinagua below left) packed together for 7 laps. With 300 meters left in the race Hardt and Breinholt picked up their pace and with 100 meters to go Hardt sprinted for the finish and crossed the line in 9:29.01. Breinholt finished second in 9:33.79.
Northwest Christian boys also had a great night winning the 4 x 100 Meter Relay in 43.64 beating out Desert Ridge. The race was very close with only .34 seconds separating the next four teams.
Sun Angel Classic
April 12, 2008
The Sun Angel Classic was an exciting place to be on Saturday evening with the debut of the new Mondo Super X track brought over from Italy earlier this year. The Mondotrack FTX, with its color coded changing lanes, is the same product that will be used for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. Arizona State University is the first U.S. venue to install it. The new track attracted athletes of all levels from all over the country as 6 meet records were set. Two high school meet records were also set, both in the 200 meter dash. Terra Evans (US#9)of South Mountain (pictured right) ran a 23.72 breaking the previous record of 23.97 set by Kenyanna Wilson from Peoria and Giorgio Giurdanella (below right) of Mountain Ridge ran a 21.56 breaking Tyler Arnolds (Highland) record of 21.83 set last year. In other events, junior Larissa Matthews (US#11) of Chandler easily won the 100H in 14.17 and senior Jerrell Peterson (Centenial) edged out Dion Jordan (Chandler) with a time of 14.76.
