In tough wind conditions, the Platte County track and field teams had a remarkable performance at the Liberty North Invitational, bringing home 14 medals and 30 top-5 finishes on April 22.
Platte County junior Reese Pickett, above, cleared the 4-11.75 foot bar to win the high jump at the Liberty North Invitational on April 22.
Platte County brought home four gold medals – two of which were from Reese Pickett – with the Lady Pirates having a great outing in the field events as they acquired three first-place finishes. Pickett won the high jump and the long jump, while finishing in second place in the triple jump.
In the high jump, the junior cleared the 4-11.75 foot bar, which was two inches higher than the second-place finisher. Pickett leaped 16-01.25 feet in the long jump and 35-04 feet in the triple jump.
Maya Sullivan took the third Lady Pirate gold medal when the senior finished in first place in the pole vault. Sullivan vaulted 11 feet, that was 1-05.75 feet above the next finisher.
Sisely Mitchell had a great day in the long-distance events, earning two silver medals in the 800 and 1,600-meter runs. Mitchell crossed the finish line with times of 2:27.95 and 5:40.25.
The Lady Pirates finished in fifth place in three relays: the 4x100-meter relay, 4x200-meter relay and 4x400-meter relay. In the distance medley relay, Platte County finished in fourth place with a time of 15:15.99.
The Platte County boys also had a solid outing with its relays – finishing in the top-6 of all five – and collected another silver medal in the 4x100-meter relay. The Pirates excelled in the 1,600-meter run when Andrew Early won the race and Andrew Johnson clinched second place.
“It felt pretty good; both of us have run faster times before and obviously at every meet you want to get PR’s, but with 25 mile per hour winds, you just want to place and have fun with it,” Andrew Early said. “I decided to go out pretty hard and I just stuck to it and pulled out the win.”
Early crossed the finish line well ahead of the rest of the runners with a time of 4:48.87, with Johnson finishing in 4:52.13. Early took a large lead in the opening lap and had to push himself to seal the win.
“It’s harder running by yourself, you have to motivate yourself. I was by myself for a majority of the race, so every 50 meters I decided to accelerate until that last stretch when I was hurting pretty bad, so I decided to just maintain to get the win,” Early said.
Victor Sewankambo ran the 100-meter dash in 11.95 seconds to bring home a silver medal, before finishing in fifth place in the 200-meter dash. Sewankambo also acquired a silver medal in the long jump with a hop of 22-03 feet.
Chandler Steinmeir collected a pair of medals in the hurdles with a second and third place finish. The Pirate earned a silver medal in the 110-meter hurdles when he finished in 16.38 seconds, while ending the 300-meter hurdles in third place in 42.40 seconds.
Andrew McClure finished in third place in the triple jump with a leap of 42-08.25, followed immediately by Zay’Quan Hall with a 42-00.75 foot hop. Carter Salzman finished in eighth place in the pole vault, Cameron Wolfe ended in seventh place in the discus and Hall clinched seventh place in the high jump.