Boys turn in good marks en route to home meet championship

    In one of the few track meets that has stayed on schedule this season, Chase County’s Invite April 17 proved to be a good day for the home team.
    Meet officials did move some jumping events to the morning due to heavier afternoon winds, but it didn’t seem to affect the Longhorn boys’ performances as they won the meet by a 58-point margin.
    Coach Carl Zuege said the team pulled through even with five or six athletes gone, and collected six first place finishes. In five events, three Longhorns won medals.
    “The kids stepped up and did a really good job,” Zuege said.
    Will Kuenne had a three gold medal day, winning both the 1600 and 3200 races and running the second leg on the first place 3200 relay team.
    Other firsts turned in by the Longhorns were from Kadin Vrbas in the 100, Eli Hinojosa in the shot and the 400 meter relay team of Vrbas, Scott Wheeler, Chase Rowley and Juan Venegas.
    The final event of the meet, the 1600 meter relay, was a race to the finish. While Chase County was edged by Dundy Co. Stratton by less than half a second, their times of 3:34.34 and 3:34.80 were the No. 1 and 2 Class C times statewide last week, Zuege said.
    There were a couple of Longhorn personal bests turned in at the meet, despite the wind.
    One came from Braden Space, who scored the silver medal in the triple jump with a 40’4.5” leap. Chase County also collected points in that even from Cedric Maxwell and Noah Griffin.
    Earning another silver for the team on a personal best effort was Taylor Jablonski in the pole vault with a vault of 11’6”.
    Jablonski had some good competition in the event, as the gold medal winner broke the meet’s pole vault record. Hershey’s Kyler Banks vaulted 14’7” to overtake a near 20-year record held by Chase County’s Kyle Kohtz set in 1999 at 14’6”.
    Kadin Vrbas continues to be at the front of the pack in the sprints, taking first in the 100 and second in the 200 last week. He went home with another medal after running on the gold 400 meter relay team, too.
    Chase Rowley also pulled down three medals in the 100, 200 and 400 meter relay.
    Zuege also noted the efforts of his middle distance runners, particularly Caleb Weiss, Juan Venegas, Scott Wheeler and Francisco Barrientos, all who scored in multiple events last week.
    Team scoring was Chase County 182, Ogallala 124, Hershey 92, Dundy Co. Stratton 85, Perkins Co. 78, Garden Co. 66, Perkins Co. JV 16, Ogallala JV 13, Dundy Co. Stratton JV 4 and Chase Co. JV 1.
    Here are the eight medalists at the meet.

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