Park Hill South’s Emma Roth set the school record in the 1,600-meter run for the second time this season, lowering her mark by less than a half second.
The junior long-distance specialist first set the school record in a season-opening quad without official results. She went 5 minutes, 19.59 seconds Thursday, April 13 in the Winnetonka Invitational at North Kansas City District Activities Complex in Kansas City, Mo. — topping second-place Kayla Wade of Grain Valley by nearly 18 seconds.
Jasmine Crawford added a win in the 800 (2:26.41) for Park Hill South, which finished fourth in the final team standings.
Park Hill South’s boys finished as runner-up in the nine-team meet. The Panthers won two of the four relays to go with three individual victories.
Ryan Rippy, a senior, won the 200 in the 23.21, narrowly edging junior teammate Melvin Walker. Brendan Bridoy (4:36.64) took the 1,600 by about a second, while Michael Garrison posted the best triple jump at 42 feet, 6 inches.
In the 4x100, Nylo Clarke, Chris Dupree, Dillon Thomas and Walker posted a season-best time by about 2½ seconds and narrowly edged Center for the title. The 4x200 of Rippy, Garrison, Dupree and Clarke went just more than 6 seconds better than the previous season best to pull away from Center.
Darwin Rold Invitational
Taiya Shelby scored another important win and inched closer to last year’s personal best in the 400-meter run.
A junior, Shelby won the event Wednesday, April 12 in Lee’s Summit, Mo., staging a late comeback. She finished in 57.32 — just 0.28 off the 57.04 mark she set in last year’s Class 5 Missouri State Track and Field Championships — and beat Raytown sophomore Shelby Butts and Liberty junior Kaitlyn Lewis, who held the lead until the final 90 meters.
Lewis was the Class 5 state runner-up last year and had beaten Shelby each time they raced except for last year’s Class 5 Sectional 4 meet.
Shelby had Park Hill’s only win, and the Trojans were fifth out of 11 teams in the final standings. She also ran on the runner-up 4x400 team with Jena Hahlbeck, Manuela Ngo Tonye Nyemeck and Iyania Roberts — a quartet that set a season-best time at 4:05.36.
Ariet King, a senior, set personal bests in the 300 hurdles (48.81) and triple jump (35-11), finishing third in both.
Park Hill’s boys were fifth out of 12 teams with two event victories and three runner-up showings. Grant Downes and Papay Glaywulu were again the standouts.
Downes easily won the 110 hurdles at 15.15 and ran 40.16 in the 300s to finish second behind Lee’s Summit West sophomore Vonzell Kelley. Downes set another personal best in the longer event and inched closer to going sub-40 for the first time.
Glaywulu took the triple jump at 46-7 and came in second in the long jump at 22-5½ — just three-quarters of an inch back of winner Delshaun Presley of Lee’s Summit. Kolby Heinerikson, a sophomore, was second in the javelin to round out the Trojans’ top-two showings.
Park Hill sophomore Parker Canfield was third in the 3,200.