As the season for the track and field team progresses, select members from the team went to a big track meet in Kansas City. Senior and team captain for the relay team, Micah Skebo, recalls how the meet went.

“Going to the Kansas relays was a great experience for myself and our relay team. We got to compete against and watch other high schools and colleges from around the nation,”  Skebo said, “We came into the meet ranked 16th overall out of the 60 high school teams there and we ran a qualifying time in the prelims to make it to the finals and we ended up placing 14th overall.”

These larger meets help the relay team improve for upcoming competitive events and get used to more intense competition.

“To me, I think the best thing about going to this meet was that we got to experience a large scale track event like this against hard competition, and in front of a lot of people,” Skebo said, “It will really help prepare our relay team for the pressure we will face in the upcoming district, sectional, and state meets.”

The setup of the meet was different compared to a standard high school meet. Senior Quentin Webert, who throws shot put on the team, was among the students to attend the meet. He describes the atmosphere of the meet.

“When you first get there, it’s huge. There are so many athletes, spectators and facilities. The meet itself is unlike a normal high school meet in a sense that it’s very professionally set up. It’s run like an Olympic meet which was cool,“ Webert said.

The members of the team that attended met an Olympic record holder, who got his start in high school.

“We watched some really good throwers and afterwards got a picture with Ryan Crouser, the 2016 Gold Medal Olympian in Shot (who also broke the Olympic shot put record and holds the boys high school discus national record),” Webert said.

A series of big meets coming up, GAC’s, are a big deal for the team. Sophomore Cameron Hatten is confident that the team has a chance of winning it all. As a result of the team’s high ranking status, the team has a chance to win at state too.

“The biggest meet ahead is the GAC meet which is a meet where all the neighboring schools attend like Howell, Howell North, East, South, and more,” said Hatten, “It is predicted that we have a chance to win the whole meet. As for the road to state, currently we are ranked 5th in the state of Missouri so we have a very good chance to win a medal at the state meet.

Webert hopes there will be a bigger crowd at upcoming events, so if you have any free time consider coming to a track meet.

“I encourage everyone to come watch a meet or two. Track and Field doesn’t get much love but we do big things!”