Knights take 6th at USCAA Nationals
Springfield. MA
Fresh off a great YSCC Conference showing, the Vermont State University Randolph Track team traveled to Springfield MA. for the USCAA National Track and Field Championships. Events started on Friday with Pole Vault, where Vermont State Randolph's Kaleb Swett finished in 3rd place to get the knights on the scoreboard in this 2-day meet. Saturday was action packed with the 10,000m race and throwing events underway just after 10am. Elijah Boucher, Ockar Lenhartz and Rio Coursen all ran the 10k. All three ran great races and finished well. Cocch Bob Dunkle indicated "These past two years with Rio, Oskar an Elijah have been fun. They work really hard and are a great example to other members of the team."
Following his 3rd place finish in the Pole Vault, Kaleb finished 7th in the Javelin, 5th in the High Jump, 4th in the 4x100 along with Givel Nunez, Luke Williams, and and Brennon Celious. Kaleb was also part of the 6th place 4x400 team along with Givel, Thomas Transue and Norman Benoit. Kaleb is a great all-round athlete and has been a great addition to the Randolph Camps and the team.
Norman Benoit competed in the 4x400 (6th) the open 400 (10th) and the 1500m (8th) setting the School record in the 1500. "Norman will be very fast his sophomore year. " His first year in college has shown surprises at how fast he can be with a 56 second 400m and setting school records in the 5000m and the 1500m.
Givel Nelson-Nunez joined the track team after basketball season. He did not have a lot of time to train but he was able to learn High Jump, Block Starts and technique in shot put and discus. "Givel is an amazing person and athlete." said coach Dunkle. "I knew with his 100m time (11.62 at Nationals) and his 200m time (24.87 he ran only once) that he could do well in the 400m." Unfortunately, with the season being so short and not much lead time for training we did not get a chance to see him run an open 400m. However, in the 4x400 Givel ran a 52 second 400 to start the team off. He also managed to finish 2nd in Nationals in the discus with a nearly 40m throw. This in his first year of throwing. Givel also finished 12th in shot and 6th in the 100m.
Luke Williams is the Captain of the throws team and has had a great season finishing 3rd at Nationals in the discus, 6th in the Shot put and 4th as part of the 4x100 team. Luke is a natural leader. He takes time to teach those who are learning and had a great impact on Givel's success.
Thomas Transue ran in the 4x400 and finished 15th in the open 400. Thomas works hard and has a great attitude in his running. He gives it his all. Our success in the 4x400 is, in part, because of Thomas.
Brennon Celious started training with the team later in the semester, missing many of the early meets. He is another talented athlete who learns fast. He finished 11th in the 100m, just missing finals, 6th in the high jump, and 11th in the long jump. We are hopomg next year, with good training, Brennon will be top 3 in several of these events.
Vermont State Randolph took 2 women to the Nationals meet. Arna Ámundadóttir competed in the discus (16th), the Shot 10th , and finished 9th in the javelin. Arna finishes the season with a school record in the shotput. We will miss Arna as she will be graduating next month.
Savannah Perry competed in the discus (18th) , Shotput (18th), and she ran the 100m (8th) and the 400m (10th) finishing the season with school records in the 100m and the 400m.
Season wrap-up... each year we make progress as a team. Our 6th place finish at nationals was unexpected as we weren't focused on team scores, though we know we have many talented athletes. We focused on individual performance in specific events. It was a fun meet and a great season. The team was runner up at conference and 10 school records were broken by the men's and women's teams, some records broken several times. Looking ahead to next season, we have some new recruits coming in for boith Cross Country and track who will help us raise the bar even higher.
