From one Roessner to another

COLDWATER, Ohio — The Fort Recovery school record in the 100-meter dash has sat under Christy Roessner’s name for over 28 years.

Now the head coach for the Indians, she got to see that record be broken.

It will still be held by a Roessner.

Anna Roessner’s time of 12.16 seconds broke the Fort Recovery High School record in the 100 dash on Tuesday during the season-opening meet at Coldwater that ended early because of rain. With only eight completed events, the Indian girls placed second with 27.5 points, while the boys finished third with 16. Coldwater topped the girls with 44.5, and Marion Local led the boys with 52.

Previously, Christy Diller, the Indians’ coach and Roessner’s aunt, held the school record with a time of 12.6 seconds set in 1996.

“I’m really happy and a little shocked,” Roessner said. “I wouldn’t want to take it from anybody else. She had it for a long time.”

Coming into the meet, Roessner held low expectations knowing that there would be strong winds that she would potentially have to fight against. Luckily for her, the nearly 25 mile-per-hour gusts weren’t coming from the direction of the finish line.

Roessner had the No. 2 seed with a time of 12.8 seconds, 0.57 behind Izzy Zahn of Coldwater. Last season, Zahn competed in the four events OHSAA Division III state championship, including the 100 dash in which she finished fifth (12.26 seconds).

“Running against her is always really fun, because I know she's gonna push me,” Roessner said. “I don’t want to lose. Having her next to me is going to help me go faster because I’m going to have it in my head that I don’t want to get beat by Izzy because she’s really fast.”

Roessner’s time of 12.16 seconds topped last year’s 200 dash state champion by 0.58 seconds. It also would have been good for third place at last year’s state championship.

Pearson finished just behind Zahn, who finished behind Pearson in long jump last year at state, with a time of 12.97.

Diller was excited about her niece breaking her 28-year record.

“That’s the best, because it’s about time it goes down, it’s been there for a while,” Diller said. “I knew she’s been gunning for it for a while and I knew she could do that.

“It was just getting her in the right situation and obviously tonight having her against Izzy and Mara it was such a good race. Anytime the three of them are in a race together they’re going to go all out because nobody wants to get beat. …

“I’m pretty excited about that because it just changes from Christy Roessner to Anna Roessner.”

Fort Recovery had three other first-place finishes. In the final event of the day, Trevor Heitkamp and Natalie Brunswick topped the 1,600 run that was combined in hopes of speeding up the meet before the rain started.

As the starting gun went off, the rain began to fall and Heitkamp built a strong lead. He never fell off as he finished with a time of 4 minutes, 36.22 seconds, which beat Mason Ayers of Coldwater by 23.78 seconds.

Brunswick and Ellie Will pulled away from their competitors early on, but stayed near each other for the first half of the race. When the rain started to pour down harder around the 1,000-meter mark, Brunswick developed a bigger lead to eventually finish first in 5:34.93. Will placed second in 5:47.46.

“It was a great rust buster,” Diller said. “Even considering how windy it was and the rain, the conditions were terrible for the mile, they all ran really strong times for first run out of the gate.”

Isaac Roessner, Anna’s brother, took home the other first-place finish in the long jump. The freshman’s top leap of 18 feet, 10 inches topped Marion Local’s Ben Seitz by a quarter of an inch.

Another surprise for the Indians came from Maddie Heitkamp. The sophomore came into the 100 hurdles seeded ninth, but ran a career best to finish fourth with a 18.93 seconds.

“She dropped over a second and a half and looked great,” Diller said. “She’s a kid that just works so hard and you can just tell it’s going to come together for her and it’s definitely starting to.”

Other top-five finishes for the Indians came from:

• Mara Pearson, second in long jump (17 feet, 7.5 inches)

• Maddie Heitkamp, fifth in long jump (14 feet, 5.25 inches)

• Karlie Niekamp, fifth in discus (88 feet, 2 inches)

• Theresa Hipple, fifth in high jump (4 feet, 6 inches)

• The boys 4x800 relay, comprised of Parker Brunswick, Reese Diller, Milo Fiely and Trevor Heitkamp, third place (9:40.86)

• The boys 4x200 relay comprised of Isaac Roessner, Caleb Smith, Matthew Marchal and Breaker Jutte came fifth (1:47.47)

“Our goal today was just to come out and compete,” Diller said. “I’m glad we got in what we did. … Most of them got something in which is good and gives us something to build off of for next week.”