DesotoExplorer.com / DHS track team brings home the gold

Archive for Thursday, April 19, 2001

April 19, 2001

The De Soto track team won a season's worth of medals at the Baker Relays Tuesday in Ottawa.

The Wildcats brought home 68 medals from the event, including several for first place.

"They do things a little differently at Baker," Coach Brad Qualls said. "You compete in teams of three for most events and combine your times or distances. Then, if the team places, everyone gets a medal."

Although bad weather kept some schools away, Qualls said his team faced some tough competition from the six 4A schools in attendance.

"There wasn't as much competition as we had expected, but I thought our team did well," he said. "There were still some tough schools there, like Baldwin, which is a track powerhouse."

First-place finishers for the Wildcats included the pole vault team of Paul Seaman and David Moore, the girls long jump team of Tiffany Bernard, Julie Beck and Laurie Wilson and the triple jump team of Bernard, Beck and Neah Howard.

The girls also brought home first place medals in the 4X400 relay. Team members were Bernard, Mary Roellchen, Kim Anderson and Lisa Lambert.

The girls high jump team of Anderson, Howard and Katie Davis also brought home the gold.

Tuesday the track team traveled to Olathe where they competed in the Olathe Invitational. The tournament is open to area athletes who did not qualify for the Kansas University Relays next weekend in Lawrence.

The team brought home two first place medals from the event and recorded several second and third-place finishes.

Bernard won the triple jump and long jump and Michael Allen won the same events for the boys.

Wilson placed second in the 3,200-meter race.

Third place finishers included: Ryan Frame, discus, Denise Robertson, javelin, Anderson, high jump, Davis, discus, Chad Johnson, 3,000-meter and Seaman, pole vault.

Julie Beck was the lone Wildcat to qualify for the KU Relays. She will compete in the triple jump and the long jump.