FRHS low in numbers

With only 13 athletes on both track teams combined, there won’t be much in the way of team success for the Indians this season. So they’ll be focused on individual events.
Fort Recovery High School’s girls track team is the larger of the two with nine athletes, including 2012 regional qualifier Elle Sutter. She leads a team on which nearly half of the runners focus on the long-distance events.
“We’ve been really focusing on the events that we can excel in,” said first-year coach Eric Hemmelgarn. “The girls’ focus is more the long-distance events and field events.”
Sutter came up just short at the district meet last season, finishing as the runner-up in the 3,200-meter run by less than two seconds. She went on to the regional meet, where she narrowly missed a state berth as she finished fifth.
The top four athletes in each regional event move on to the state finals.
“Last year she missed by (seven seconds),” said Hemmelgarn of the junior, who was a state qualifier in cross country as a freshman. “State’s obviously the goal. … That’s her focus.”
Joining Sutter in the long-distance events are the team’s lone senior, Sam Tobe, junior Jessica Vogel and freshman Caitlyn Huelskamp.
Tobe finished seventh in the district in the 1,600 run last season.
“They are very strong,” said Hemmelgarn. “I heard a lot about them before I even came to coach here. They’ve been very impressive. Not only are they great in track, they’re good off the track. It’s nice to have good core leadership like that.”
The only other returning athlete who scored for the Indians at last season’s district meet is junior Hannah Kaup. She finished sixth in the long jump as she cleared the 15-foot mark and will look to climb to the regional level this year.
Kaup will also compete in the high jump along with Huelskamp, who was the Mercer County Meet middle school champion in the event last season.
Emilie Sheridan and Rachel Pugh will compete in the hurdles, and Sierra Pugh will focus on the sprints.
Derek Sutter leads a boys team that will have just four competitors. The junior finished 12th in the 3,200 run in the district meet last season, and was a regional qualifier in cross country during his sophomore year.
Sam Huelskamp will join Sutter in the distance events as he competes in the 800 run and 1,600 run along with the shot put and long jump. David Trobridge will be the team’s sprinter while also throwing the shot put, and Xavier Shauver is focused on the shot put, discus and sprints.
“We just want to see that they’re giving their maximum effort each meet and they’re representing Fort Recovery well,” said Hemmelgarn, a 1996 St. Henry graduate. “We may have small numbers, but we can compete in certain events ... and still be strong in those.”[[In-content Ad]]