Randall inches closer

Copyright 2019, The Commercial Review

All Rights Reserved

Gavin Randall’s career-best jump came in May of his junior season.

After clearing 6 feet, 3 inches, he could never jump higher than 6 feet.

He got past that height easily on Thursday, and as the bar was raised an inch higher he was the lone competitor remaining.

He had room to spare in clearing it on his first attempt. The same was true at the next height as well.

Staring at the highest bar he’s ever reached, with his teammates close by, the Patriot senior wasn’t able to match his career best. But now he’s got the confidence reaching that height wasn’t a fluke.

“It’s only up from here,” said Randall, whose Jay County High School boys track team finished third in a meet with sectional rivals Yorktown and Delta. Yorktown scored 71 points to win, and Delta was the runner-up with 58 points. Jay County finished with 27 points.

Jay County’s girls won eight events en route to 78.5 points and first place. Delta (40) and Yorktown (37.5) were second and third respectively.

“I’ve had a couple rough starts but I think I’m starting to feel a little bit better, more comfortable,” Randall continued.

And after nearly a year of never jumping more than 6 feet, the senior is confident he can improve on his best height.

“He has been putting in some work,” JCHS boys coach Joe Imel said. “We changed his approach so we’ve been working on that. He missed (6-3) today but he was really, really close to achieving that. There are some other drills we can include to try to push him over the hump.

“Today, getting over the 6-1, and 6-2 as easy as he did, I think, is just going to give him confidence and that drive to continue to work harder at it.”

Randall’s victory was the only one for the Patriots, who nearly squeaked out a win in the 4x100-meter relay as well if not for getting disqualified for starting early. It was the first time this season the squad made up of Trey Castillo, Nathanael Day, Caleb Webster and Randall didn’t win.

“Just took off early in the fourth leg,” Imel said. “Something that we need to address in practice and continue to work on that … We knew this was going to be a competitive 4x1 than what we have been facing so I believe that nerves just got to us.”

Jay County’s girls took the top two spots in the 100 dash, 200 dash, 400 dash and 300 hurdle events.

Kinsey Shannon won the 200 dash in 28.22 seconds, a mere 0.67 seconds ahead of Renee Omstead, and was runner-up to Calli Stigleman (13.21 seconds) in the 100 dash by one hundredth of a second.

Ashlyn Dow (1 minute, 4.69 seconds) and Halle Hill were first and second respectively in the 400 dash, while Abby Benter (52.39 seconds) and Grace Saxman were one-two in the 300 hurdles.

Shea Bailey, Karlie Bullard, Stigleman and Omstead won the 4x100 relay in 53.39 seconds. Sophie Fugiett, Lindy Wood, Cheyenne Liette and Dow teamed to take first in the 4x800 relay in 11:08.74. Benter, Omstead, Saxman and Dow had a time of 4:25.41 in the 4x400 for a clean sweep of the relays.

“It was a good meet for us,” JCHS girls coach Brian McEvoy said. “I have been really challenging the girls, we needed no weak links.

“This was our first meet where we were all coming together and looked good. We did not look that good as soon as two days ago.”

Senior Shelby Clark had a distance of 30 feet, 10 inches, to win shot put, the first victory of her career as first-year track athlete.