Mara Pearson of Fort Recovery High?School soars through the air in the long jump competition during the Indians’ meet April 12 against Versailles and St. John’s. Pearson, a sophomore, won the event at the Mercer County Meet on Tuesday at Coldwater with a leap of 17 feet, 2 inches. (The Commercial Review/Ray Cooney)
Mara Pearson of Fort Recovery High?School soars through the air in the long jump competition during the Indians’ meet April 12 against Versailles and St. John’s. Pearson, a sophomore, won the event at the Mercer County Meet on Tuesday at Coldwater with a leap of 17 feet, 2 inches. (The Commercial Review/Ray Cooney)
COLDWATER, Ohio — Mara Pearson started her season by breaking her own school record.

Now she’s proven herself to be the best leaper in the county this year.

Pearson gave the Fort Recovery High School girls track team a good start Tuesday as she won the long jump on the opening day of the Mercer County Meet at Coldwater.

She helped the Tribe girls score 24 points, which currently has them sitting in third place behind Celina (28) and the host Cavaliers (25).

The FRHS boys are currently last with three points in the six-team field.

The meet will resume at 4:30 p.m. Thursday.

Pearson, a sophomore, was the only jumper in the field to clear the 17-foot mark. She turned in a winning leap of 17 feet, 2 inches, with Coldwater freshman Izzy Zahn as the runner-up at 16 feet, 8.5 inches.

She also qualified fifth in the preliminaries of the 200-meter dash.

Whitley Rammel gave the Indian girls another strong showing in a field event, taking the runner-up spot in the discus. Her distance of 103 feet, 4 1/2 inches, was second only to Celina’s Amelia Lutz at 111 feet, 4.5 inches.

Also Tuesday, the Fort Recovery 4x800 relay team turned in a third-place finish. Natalie Brunswick, Ellie Will, Joelle Kaup and Brynn Stammen teamed for a time of 10 minutes, 32.94 seconds, as they trailed Celina and Coldwater.

Two Indian sprinters put themselves in strong positions for the finals Thursday.

Freshman Anna Roessner earned the No. 2 seed in the 400 dash with a time of 1:04.99. She sits well behind No. 1 seed Ava Giere (59.85) of Coldwater and looks to be in a two-way battle for the runner-up spot with Celina’s Allison Schwieterman (1:05.17).

Abbie Francis picked up the No. 3 seed for the Indians in the 100 dash. Her time of 13.59 left her behind Coldwater’s Allison Hamberg (13.23) and Parkway’s Morgan Hunter (13.37), with a pair of Celina athletes less than 0.05 behind her.

Ross Pearson turned in the top effort for the FRHS boys as he tied for fourth place in the high jump with Luke Pohlman of Marion Local. They both cleared the bar at 5 feet, 4 inches.

Other Tribe girls qualifying for championship races Thursday were Kennedy Muhlenkamp (fifth – 400 dash) and Kiana Matsuda (sixth – 300 hurdles).