Albion's Amelia Bannister had just won her third event at the Division 3 girls track and field finals this weekend in Grand Rapids and was walking around with an ice pack on her leg.
“I'm not used to doing this,” Bannister said.
It was Bannister's final meet before she takes her talents to Michigan State University. She won the 100-meter dash in 12.36 seconds, the 400-meter dash in 56.84 seconds and the 4x100-meter relay in 50.51 seconds.
“The key was getting out of the blocks good and don't break down before the line,” Bannister said.
Frankenmuth won the Division 3 meet with 68 points followed by Benzie Central with 48 and Albion with 39.
But Bannister, as an individual athlete, stole the show with her performances, which also included a seventh-place finish in the 4x400-meter relay.
“I'm happy with it,” Bannister said. "The key (in the 400) has been getting out hard and keeping your form in the finish. I've had the right training, not wanting to stress your legs out before the races.”
Pulling a muscle even had Bannister surprised.
“I've never ever done this before,” she said.
She's going to Michigan State on a full ride scholarship even while admitting she didn't always have the school high on her list.
“Now that I've checked it out, I feel very lucky,” she said.
Frankenmuth felt very lucky with three first places that fueled its championship effort. Kelsey Ritter won the 200-meter dash in 25.32 and was second in the 400-meter dash in 57.09 seconds. She was also on the 4x200-meter relay and 4x400-meter relay teams that took first place in 1:44.0 and 4:00.89, respectively.
On the boys' side, Albion celebrated the Division 3 title with 61 ½ points, comfortably ahead of Allendale and Kent City, who both scored 43.
Albion was led by Ryan Hopson, who was first in the long jump at 22-10 ½ and the 4x200-meter relay team of Patrick Dewalt, Hopson, Darius Crum and Todd Atchison, first in 1:30.39. The same threesome of Dewalt, Hopson, Atchsion and Dion Mitchell was first in 43.82 in the 4x100-meter relay. Atchison won the 200-meter dash in 21.86 seconds.
Michael Parker of Michigan Center was first in the 300-meter hurdles in 37.98 seconds with a new meet record.
Allendale was led by Zack Hill, who set two new meet records with throws of 181-0 in the discus and 63-9 ½ in the shot put.
Sparta's Brandon Vandriel won the 100-meter dash in 10.98 seconds for the third straight year.
Division 4
Potterville, located outside of Lansing, doubled up in Division 4 with both the boys and girls winning state titles. The girls race was close with Potterville posting 51 points compared to 43 for Fowler and 37 for Pewamo-Westphalia.
It's the second straight state title for Potterville's girls track team and the first time both boys and girls have done it the same season. The 4x200-meter relay team of Jill Witaker, Jenna Whipple, Kaila Cook and Kelsey Letson set a new finals meet record in 1:45.38 for Potterville in taking a key first-place effort. Potterville got a first place from the 4x400-meter relay foursome of Jenna Whipple, Justeen Roe, Kaila Cook and Kelsey Letson with a time of 4:06.32.
Kirstie Wieber of Pewamo-Westphalia set a new Lower Peninsula Division 4 finals meet record with a clearance of 11 feet, 3 inches in the pole vault.
“The boys team was the stronger of the two and we thought they should win,” Potterville coach Mike Kuyers said. “The girls meet was much more up in the air where there were three teams that were equal going into the meet and it was a matter of who had the best day.”
He was especially impressed with the efforts of Letson, who along with first places in the two relays had fourth places in the 200-meter and 400-meter runs plus Kaila Cook who was second in the 300-meter hurdles.
Liz Sherzer of Battle Creek St. Philip set a new meet record with a time of 15.14 seconds in the 100-meter hurdles.
Pewamo-Westphalia set a meet record in 50.63 seconds in the 4x100-meter relay with the team of Rachel Schmitt, Allison Fedewa, Kara Thelen and Abbey Hengebach.
A three-peat for next season is possible but won't be easy, Kuyers said.
“We're a smaller team this season,” he said. “We graduated 10 seniors from last year. We did some struggling. We only had 18 girls this season. At the state meet, we only had six girls. All six had a great day.”
Division 2
East Lansing snuck out of the Division 2 state track meet at Zeeland as state champions by the narrowest of margins. The top six teams were within eight points of each other.
East Lansing secured its first girls state title with 36 points, compared to 34 for another Lansing area school, DeWitt, 31 for Chelsea, 30 for Detroit Renaissance, 29 for Lansing Sexton and 28 for Middleville-Thornapple Kellogg.
The East Lansing 800-meter relay team of Malika Glover, Hannah Fitzpatrick, Mercedes Lee, Victoria Lipscomb was first in 1:43.48. It was the only first-place finish for East Lansing which also got key points from Lipsomb who was second in the long jump in 18-3 ½ and third in the 200-meter dash in 26.19 seconds.
Doublewinners were Tori Desira of DeWitt in the 100-meter hurdles in 15.22 seconds and the 300-meter hurdles in 45.18 seconds and Ashlee Abraham of Detroit Renaissance in the 100-meter dash in 12.50 seconds and the 200-meter dash in 25.66 seconds.
On the boys' side, Hamilton won its first ever state track title with 61 points, finishing well ahead of Williamston, with 38 points. It was the third state title in school history
Coach Kevin Spotts said the team did not go into the season necessarily thinking it was a state title contender.
“We felt we had some great senior leadership and some good goals for us would be to win conference, regionals and go to the team meet,” Spotts said. “About a month ago when our times really started going down and our long jumpers and high jumpers started doing some great things that we thought maybe...we had a great regional and beat the second-place team by 48 points. The guys then got excited about what could be.”
Austin Schild, Matt Tyink, David Ptacek and Zach Heerspink combined for a 1:28.49 in the 4x200-meter relay for a key Hamilton first-place effort with Troy Sneller first in 38.83 and Dakota Sale second in 39.31.
Hamilton was one-two in the 300 meter hurdles. Stephen Murphy of Madison Heights Lamphere was first in the 400-meter dash in 47.94 seconds for a new meet record.
Sale, Troy Sneller, David Ptacek and Michael Hoffman were first in the 4x400-meter relay in 3:22.40.
“Every event and every runner had their personal best of the season at that track meet,” Spotts said. “You hope that will take place but it always doesn't happen that way. We were ecstatic about our performance. Our hurdlers, it's rare to go one-two at a state meet.”
Division 1
The Division 1 meet at East Kentwood had a team finish as exciting as Division 2. The top three teams were within two points of each other. It came down to the last event of the season.
Romulus won the state meet with 38 points, followed by Rockford with 37 and three-time defending state champion Ann Arbor Pioneer with 36. Not too far back was fourth-place Rochester with 33 points and Flint Southwestern and Waterford Mott with 21 points apiece.
Rockford was led by Sarah Birkemier who cleared 13 feet in the pole vault to beat the old record by 10 inches.
Christienne Linton of Romulus led the state champions by covering 18-8 ¼ in the long jump for first place. She also won the 300-meter hurdles in 42.86 to set a new meet record.
That set up a showdown between the top three teams in the 4x400-meter relay to end the meet. Kanaya Williams, Britnee Bishop, Linton and Rutherford finished the race in 3:52.53 to secure the title, followed by Rockford in 3:54.28 and Ann Arbor Pioneer in 3:55.34.
On the boys' side, it was no contest. East Kentwood handily won the Division 1 track and field championship on its home track with 79 points, more than twice as many as the second-place team, Portage Northern, which had 34 points.
Jon Henry was the big gun for East Kentwood. He won the 100-meter dash in 10.89 seconds. He was on the 4x200-meter relay team that also included Tyrone Green, Dallas Wade and Christian Jessie, which set a Lower Peninsula Division 1 finals meet record at 1:26.72. Henry combined with Wade, Green and Kody Dantuma for first in the 4x100-meter relay with another state record of 41.77 seconds.
EK won a third relay event, the 4x400 meters, with a time of 3:21.14, with the foursome of Hurst, Chad Weesies, Isaac Cox and Jessie.
Also for EK, Deonte Hurst won the 300-meter hurdles in 38.01 seconds.
Jeff Kline of Flushing set a new state finals meet record by covering 24 feet, one inch in the long jump.
Michale Atchoo of Troy won the 1,600-meter run in 4:07.1 to set a new meet record.
