Track Season Kicks Off Spring Sports Season This Week

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Ryan (Fuzz) French, Staff Writer, Advanced Journalism

With the track season officially starting this week, spring sports are off to a start.

The first track practice is Monday, March 4, and thus begins a season that will hopefully last until the state track meet in June. The team will have indoor meets all through March, and if the snow decides to stay, maybe even into April.

The team is strong this year with participation from students from all classes. The JV team will be primarily freshmen and sophomores, and the seniors and juniors will mainly make up the varsity.

However, there is room for underclassmen to make the varsity through time trials and by excelling in field events like long jump, shot put and pole vault.

“We’re excited to see what kind of talent we will have this year and how the students will perform once the racing and competition fully starts,” said Head Coach Molly French.

The chances at making state are higher than they have been in the past.

The Tritons have been competing at the D1 level for over four years and now that they are D2, the Tritons will not have to compete with the bigger schools like Bay Port, Preble and Kimberly.

“We hope to get more kids to state, and I believe it’s possible just because we’re Division 2 now,” French said.

Some athletes hoping for another state trip include Charlie Sauter and Ellie Rose. Rose qualified in high jump last year while Charlie Sauter made it in the open 400 and

qualified for the finals at the state meet.

There are some old faces returning to the coaching staff, including Coach Jolene Blindauer, Chris Nowak and Dylan Lang.  All will be re-joining French, who took over the head coaching role after the death of veteran track coach John Nowak.

The throwers coach, Kevin Butters, accepted a coaching job with East High School as their new head coach. Replacing Butters will be Aj Giovannetti’s father, Tony Giovannetti.

The boys team will get their first crack at competition next week with the first indoor meet of the year. The girls will have their first meet in late March.