Salida Sweeps Center Titles, Barely

Morgaan Walters-Schaler made her trip to Center sing to the tune of three individual titles. Colorado Track XC file photo by Alan Versaw.

With both teams down a key athlete or two Salida and Buena Vista still managed to dominate today's Center Invitational. Salida won both team titles, but by the razor-thin margin of a single point on the girls side.

Running at 7600 feet of elevation, you don't necessarily expect the distance runners to turn up great times, but Taylor Stack's 10:15.80 counts as a great mark for Center's thin air. Buena Vista's Lynzi Doke, a burro racer of some local reputation, swept the girls 16 and 32 titles. She was not, however, seen coaxing a burro back over Poncha Pass to get home. Evidently, the school bus works better for that, and South Park probably would have declined to lend out their mascot for the occasion, anyway.

Stack didn't quite manage the sweep of the 16 and 32 as Ro Paschal of Mancos and Corey Lewenkamp of Custer County beat him to the finish line in that race.

The sprinters had zero issues with the thin air. Salida's Morgaan Walters-Schaler got her senior season off to an impressive debut with a sweep of the 100, 200, and 400. Only in the 100 was it even close, as Walters-Schaler beat Sangre de Cristo's Sarah Storey by a mere hundredth of a second. To put that into perspective, that's a difference of about three inches at the finish line. Good thing we have cameras...

But, it wasn't just local talent that showed up for this meet. James Irwin came down out of Colorado Springs. Miguel Molas was anxious to try out the six-lane high-altitude proving facility at Center High School. He did. And he blew up the meet records for the 100 and 200 in the process. In fact, he very nearly blew up the track. 10.95 and 22.40, both wind legal.

Another non-local, Ivan Mendoza of West Grand, dusted the competition in the 110 hurdles with a 16.29, but succumbed to Cooper Eggleston of Buena Vista, who posted an impressive 41.97. For the record, I recall another Eggleston who ran for Buena Vista a few years back and made a few impressions along the way. I'm going out on a fat limb and suggesting the two might be related.

The girls hurdles went the way of South Park's Kacey Buttrick. In itself, that doesn't qualify as much of a surprise, but perhaps her margin of victory of more than six seconds in the 300 hurdles does. She very nearly had time to catch her breath before second place crossed the line. Such is her measure of domination in the event.

Although Sarah Storey did miss the 100-meter title, she got one back with a winning long jump of 16-8. She got two back with a winning triple jump of 34-0. That likely qualifies as a solid season opening effort.

Teammate Jenna McKinley had a solid season opener of her own, winning the shot put at 36-8.5 and the discus at 113-7. Both marks should easily advance her to state.

An interesting thing happened in the boys high jump. The top three seeds each checked in at 5-10. When all the dust had settled on the cover of the high jump pit, all three ended up at 5-10 for the day. Salida's Colton Newcomb, however, took the win over Zach James and Andrew Plunkett on misses.

The stop-you-in-your-tracks mark of the meet, however, belonged to Monte Vista triple jumper Jose Flores. Assuming the marks are correct as reported, Flores came in with a seed of 37-10 and left with a PR of 45-5.5. That, ladies and gentlemen, is what is known as a 3A chart-busting triple jump. And that would leave 17 places left to settle.

Complete Results