Trewyn takes title

MUNCIE — Andrew Trewyn was already a conference champion.
Thursday, he added a sectional title.
Trewyn, a Jay County High School junior, won the high jump as the lone title for the Patriot boys track team at the sectional meet at Muncie Central.
“Feels great because I won and I get to go to regional,” said Trewyn, who cleared 6 feet, 1 inch, an inch more than his championship-winning height at the Allen County Athletic Conference meet a week ago.
“He’s kind of been hanging around 6 (feet) and (6 feet, 3 inches),” said Kurt Hess, the Patriots’ first-year coach. Trewyn set a personal best of 6 feet, 5 inches, during the indoor season, but hasn’t been able to duplicate that performance outside. “Hopefully next week he’ll peak at the right time. This week he’s been working on his form because he doesn’t have the best form.”
Yorktown knocked off defending champion Muncie Central by scoring 118 points, four more than the host Bearcats. Delta was third with 113.5, and Jay County totaled 39.5 for seventh place.
Hess said he would have liked to see his team score a few more points.
“Guess we’d say we’re not pleased (with seventh), we’re not displeased,” he said. “Not as disappointing as it could be.”
Senior Aaron Neal was the only other Patriot to qualify for regional — the top three places in each event earn a regional berth — doing so in two events.
He set a new career best in the long jump on his second attempt with a distance of 21 feet, 4 inches, beating his seeded distance by 18 inches. It stood as the leader until the finals, during which Brandt Applegate of Yorktown pushed him into second place.
“Half inch,” Neal said of the difference between him and Applegate, disappointed he wasn’t able to surpass him in his last three attempts.
“I was feeling good today,” said Neal, who was also the runner-up in the 110-meter hurdles.
He finished with a time of 15.26 seconds behind Delta’s Trevor Vorhees (15.07).
“My start in the finals was god-awful,” he said. He had the best preliminary time of 16.17 seconds. “I definitely need to work on starts (and) form over the hurdles. Simple fundamentals.”
Neal was the only Jay County boy to qualify for regional last season, but an illness kept him from competing. This year he’s hopeful he and Trewyn can motivate each other.
Nathan Heitkamp was seeded third in the long jump, but wasn’t able to compete because of a hip injury. It also kept him from performing to his full potential in the 4x400 relay, which Hess thought had a shot to advance to regional.
“Expected more out of Heitkamp,” Hess said. “Just a nagging injury all season that never seemed to get better. Wish his senior season would have finished on a better note.”
Jay County’s 4x800 relay team of Luke Weaver, Dallas Dudelston, Tyler Leonhard and Travis Barton was fifth in 9 minutes, 1.4 seconds.
Heitkamp anchored the 4x400 relay team of Tyler Leonhard, Isaac Robbins and Neal that placed seventh (3:59.57) as the only other relay team to score points.
Neal added a fourth-place finish in the high jump (5 feet, 8 inches), and Trewyn was seventh in the 110 hurdles (17.02). Isaac Robbins also scored for Jay County with an eighth-place finish in the 300 hurdles in 45.79 seconds.