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Baxter, Rio Mesa 4x400 relay team win state titlesPublished by
Baxter, Rio Mesa 4x400 relay team win state titlesRunaway victories
Caitlin Turner of Thousand Oaks gets 3rd place in the girls 800m run at the Track and Field Championships at Veterans Memorial Stadium at Buchanan High School in Clovis. CLOVIS —On every backstretch, Kevin Baxter implored his daughter to pick up the pace. For eight laps Simi Valley High sophomore Sarah Baxter heard every word. "How couldn't you?" Baxter said. Between listening and blocking out the message, Baxter repeated as champion of the girls 3,200-meter race Saturday at the CIF State Track and Field Championships at Buchanan High. The goal was to reach a sub-10 minute time. Unchallenged by the rest of the field, left in her footsteps at the end of two laps, Baxter won in 10 minutes, 12 seconds. "I wanted to break 10 minutes. I tried to be on pace," she said. Baxter is halfway toward becoming a four-time champion in the event. Rio Mesa became the first Ventura County school to win a state title in the boys 4x400 relay. The team of Darion Zimmerman, Cameron Roach, Anthony Teart and Blake Selig finished in 3:16.21, winning by more than two seconds. "When Blake got the handoff, I knew nobody was going to catch us," Rio Mesa coach Brian FitzGerald said. "The time wasn't great, but because of the (windy) conditions, it was the equivelant of a 3:12. The only relevance was where we were in relation to the other teams." The title made up for a remarkably close second-place finish for Rio Mesa in the short relay. In one of the closest finishes in state championship history, Rio Mesa was runner-up in the boys 4x100 relay by three-thousandth of a second. Khalfani Muhammad of Notre Dame-Sherman Oaks caught Rio Mesa anchor Roach just before the finish line to give his team the final margin of 41.122 to 41.225. It was strikingly similar to the 2010 championship final, when Rio Mesa was passed in the closing meters to place second. Rio Mesa came into the final with the state's fastest time of 40.95. Defending state champion Oaks Christian was disqualified for a zone violation on the first exchange. "I knew that Khalfani was coming through," Roach said. "He is a great sprinter and pushed through. I lost my footing and stumbled at the end." Muhammad won the boys 100 and 200 titles as well. Selig, who was a member of that 2010 team and ran the second leg on Saturday, was not disappointed. "We came close," said Selig, who placed fifth in the 100 at 10.73. "Everyone did the best that they could; that's all that matters." From his spot after making the first handoff, Roderick White thought "we had it all the way." "I don't know how you quantify three-thousandth of a second,"FitzGerald said. Rio Mesa placed fifth in the boys team standings. For the second straight year, Oak Park's Connor Stark was runner-up in the boys pole vault. Like champion Peter Chapman of Murrieta, Stark cleared 16 feet, 4 inches. While Chapman made it on his second attempt, Stark needed three tries. Both missed on three attempts at 16-8. Westlake's Luigi Colella was eighth at 14-10. Caitlin Turner of Thousand Oaks fell 0.13 of a second off the Ventura County record for the girls 800 with a time of 2:09.75. She did equal the best finish in the event by a county runner, placing third. "I have no regrets," Turner said. "I did what I could." Turner passed two runners in the last 150 meters. "I usually make my move with 250 to go," said the Long Beach State-bound runner. "But my coach told me that these elite runners will fight back if you go too early. Physically, I thought that if I can pass the next runner, I could get fourth. Then, if I can pass the next one, I could get third." In a race featuring five of the top 11 sprinters in the nation, Oak Park's Sydney Lewis was fourth in the girls 100 in 11.73."My start was more powerful than yesterday," Lewis said. "The other girls just caught me. It was very good competition. My goal at the start of the season was just to make the state so I can't complain." Danni Alakija, who was busy with six races in two days, placed sixth in the girls 400 in 55.57. The Oaks Christian junior also competed in two relays. Buena High freshman Erinn Beattie and Rio Mesa's Raegan Nizdil had good attempts at 5-7, knocking the bar off with their calves. Beattie cleared 5-3 and 5-5 on her first attempts to tie for sixth. Nizdil had one miss at 5-5 to finish eighth. Kendall Mader of Newbury Park placed seventh in the girls discus with a mark of 134-11, less than three feet off of her personal best. Just off of its season best in the girls 4x100 relay was Oaks Christian, which grabbed fourth in 47.16. The Lions were also fifth in the girls 4x400 relay in 3:52.03. County record holder Jazzelena Black was seventh in the girls triple jump with a best of 38-5.25.
Read the full article at: www.vcstar.com
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