STRONG TO THE FINISH LINE
GREAT NORTHERN CONFERENCE TRACK & FIELD
Solid GNC efforts hopefully carry into next week
The heat made things uncomfortable and a 1-hour, 45-minute lightning delay with about an hour of competition left was frustrating. But the Medford Raiders made the best of it while hosting Tuesday’s Great Northern Conference championships at Raider Field.
While the Raiders just didn’t have the depth to contend for team titles, they put up several season-best times and distances and won five event championships to put a strong cap on their regular season. The girls finished second in the team standings with 136 points, well behind Mosinee’s 197.5 points, while the boys were fourth with 91.5 points. Mosinee swept the team titles by edging Rhinelander 149.5-144 in the boys meet.
Junior Joe Sullivan was a two-time winner in the boys meet, taking the 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs. The girls took the 3,200- and 800-meter relay championships and got a 400-meter dash title from sophomore Bryn Fronk.
“I know it was hot. It was hot for everybody,” Medford head coach Shawn Sullivan said. “A lot of the athletes stepped up. They raced hard, they worked together as a team. We made quite a few changes to try to be competitive. Some kids did a few different events, but it did work out. I was really proud of everybody. They were smart, they took care of themselves during the meet and I think it showed just by the fact that there were a lot of PRs.”
As expected, Medford’s girls put up some solid point totals on the track.
The 3,200-meter team of Alexis Fleegel, Jennifer Kahn, Brooke Rudolph and Alicia Kawa got the meet off to a good start, sweating its way to an easy win in a season-best time of 10:36.29. They beat Tomahawk (11:08.51) and Mosinee (12:55.21). Later, Marissa Fronk, Sophie Brost, Alyssa Brandner and Jaylin Machon won the 800-meter relay in 1:53.62, a 1.89-second margin over Tomahawk. It was the first time those four had run this race together.
The Raiders added third-place points in the other two relays. Brost, Brenley Beran, Lindsey Klapatauskas and Machon teamed up to finish the 400-meter race in 54.54 seconds, beating Northland Pines for that spot by 0.11 seconds. Rhinelander won in 52.06 seconds and Mosinee (53.88) was second. Karli Higgins, Brandner, Rudolph and Bryn Fronk caught Tomahawk in the last lap of the 1,600-meter relay and closed the meet with a time of 4:26.27, finishing behind Lakeland (4:17.65) and Mosinee (4:17.7).
Bryn Fronk’s first GNC title was earned with a time of 1:01.57 in the 400. She was 0.66 seconds ahead of Lakeland’s Grace Kern. Higgins was fifth for the Raiders in 1:06.93 in her first open 400 of 2021. Bryn Fronk also took third in the 200-meter dash at 27.01 seconds, just ahead of her older sister Marissa, who posted a season-best time of 27.29 seconds. Higgins just missed scoring, taking ninth at 28.97 seconds in her first open 200 of the spring.
Marissa Fronk took third in the 100-meter dash at 13.25 seconds, Brost was fifth at 13.49 seconds and Klapatauskas was 10th at a personal-best 14.04 seconds.
Kawa put 16 points on the board with a pair of runner-up finishes in the distance events. Her 3,200-meter time of 12:13.79 was a season-best. Northland Pines star Nora Gremban had a fabulous time of 10:59.2. Kahn was fifth in a season-best 12:46.65 and Ella Daniels was sixth at 14:29.13. The girls and boys ran the 3,200-meter race together after the storm and Medford’s three girls and two boys all set PRs.
“I guess the cooler weather had something to do with it,” Sullivan said. “But that delay can also bring you back down.”
Kawa ran the 1,600-meter race in 5:37.78 to fall 13.53 seconds behind Gremban. Fleegel lowered her time to 5:58.69 to place fourth, 3.34 seconds behind Mosinee’s Olivia Donohue but almost 25 seconds ahead of fifth-place runner Sylvia Meza of Lakeland.
Fleegel added fifth-place points in the 800-meter run at 2:37.12. Gremban won that race as well in 2:23.37.
The late-season move to hurdles continued to pay off for Machon, who took third in the 100-meter highs at a new best time of 18.52 seconds. Beran got the eighth-place point at 20.35 seconds in a race won by Mosinee’s Claire Selenske in 17.55 seconds. Rudolph set a personalbest time of 53.51 seconds and took fourth in the 300-meter low hurdles.
“It was really cool in the 100 meter hurdles that both of our girls placed in a flight of 12,” Sullivan said. “Those were PRs for both of them. Jaylin finished strong. That’s her highest finish.”
Machon and Daniels both cleared 7 feet, 6 inches to share second place in the pole vault competition, won by Lakeland’s Olivia Wingo at 10 feet, which Sullivan said was big. Daniels finished her vaults right after running the 3,200.
“That was our best placement in that event,” Sullivan said. “That brought us 14 points. That was huge.”
Higgins took fourth with her best long jump effort of the season, a leap of 15-3.5. Beran got the eighth-place point at a personal- best 13-9.75 and Rudolph was right behind her at 13-8.75.
Brost hit a personal-best 30-6.5 in the triple jump and placed fifth. Klapatauskas (27-2.25) and Hannah Fleegel (25-9) were 12th and 13th. Klapatauskas got the eighth-place point in the shot put at 25-7, while Lacey Brandner set a personal best of 54 feet while tying for 15th in the discus. She was 16th in the shot put at 18-9.
Antigo, behind two wins from thrower Heather Arlen and two from sprinter and jumper MacKenzie Wissbroecker, took third with 91 points, followed by Lakeland (78), Rhinelander (69.5), Northland Pines (60) and Tomahawk (50).
Boys results
Joe Sullivan put himself into the conversation for the GNC Boys Runner of the Year award –– which ultimately went to Mosinee’s Cyle Kowalski –– by beating the heat and the opposition in the distance races.
He and Sam Gremban of Northland Pines set the pace in the 1,600-meter run before Sullivan pulled away in the last two laps and won in 4:37.71, 10.91 seconds ahead of Gremban. In the 3,200-meter run, it was Tomahawk’s Drew Bolder who tried his best to keep up, but Sullivan pulled away from him too in the last two laps to win by 9.86 seconds in a personal-best 10:00.42. Raider senior Jack Tlusty found a late kick and grabbed the third spot in 12:00.26, beating Antigo’s James Meade by 3.39 seconds.
“Joe was looking for a sub-10 in two mile,” Shawn Sullivan said. “He missed it by 0.42. He’s getting there. He’s right there. It’ll happen.”
Ty Baker earned a pair of high finishes in the jumps. He sailed a personal-best 41-1.25 in the triple jump, which was good for second behind Mosinee’s Kyle Miller (41-11.75). Carson Church was 11th at 358. Baker entered the high jump for the first time this season and topped out at 5-8, good for a fourth-place tie with Lakeland’s Maverick Metzger. Jaden Beske of Rhinelander won it at 6 feet.
Unfortunately, Baker scratched on what looked like some good distances in the long jump.
“Sometimes when you’re trying to put it out there, you’re really going for it, that happens,” Sullivan said. “He did well in the triple though at 41-1.25. That was a good jump.”
Junior Jake Seifert scored in both throws, including a personal-best effort of 109-8 in the discus, which put him in fourth place behind Walker Beyerl of Mosinee (123-0), Kaden Chillemi of Rhinelander (115-11) and Conner Jensen of Rhinelander (112-5). Seifert was sixth in the shot put at 37-4. Lakeland’s William Stone won that at 39-11.25.
Medford finished fourth in all three of the relays the Raiders entered. The 800-meter team of Cole Dassow, Logan Kawa, Colton Surek and Tyler Kapitz finished in 1:42.05, trailing Antigo (1:40.02), Rhinelander (1:40.41) and Northland Pines (1:41.67). The 400-meter team of Cory Lindahl, Kawa, Surek and Dassow was clocked at 48.99 seconds to trail Rhinelander (45.47), Northland Pines (45.81) and Lakeland (48.58).
Church, Lindahl, Owen Wipf and Kapitz wrapped things up by posting a time of 3:42.23 in the 1,600-meter relay. Lakeland won in 3:35.63, followed by Rhinelander (3:37.92) and Antigo (3:40.88).
Also on the track, Church (2:16.02) and Wipf (2:18.17) took the fourth- and fifthplace points in the 800-meter run, while Josh Clark (2:29.75) was 11th. Church (54.94) and Wipf (55.31) were sixth and seventh in the 400-meter dash. Lindahl (21.79) and Lucas Borman (22.55) were sixth and seventh in the 110-meter high hurdles. Kapitz got two seventh-place points in the 200-meter dash at 24.38 seconds, while Kawa (28.25) was 16th. Dassow (12.23) and Borman (12.51) were 13th and 15th in the 100-meter dash with Borman setting a personal-best time.
Lindahl set a personal-best mark of 184.75 while taking fifth in the long jump, while Wipf was eighth at 16-5.25. Kawa tied his best at 9 feet in the pole vault to place fifth. Jude Stark (8-0) and Adam Kowalski (7-0) were 10th and 11th.
Northland Pines edged Medford by 1.5 points to finish third in the team standings. Lakeland (80.5), Antigo (69.5) and Tomahawk (57) were fifth, sixth and seventh.
The GNC JV meet that was scheduled for today, Thursday, has been canceled, putting all of Medford’s focus now on the WIAA Division 2 post-season, which starts Monday with the regional meet at Raider Field. Medford will welcome all the GNC squads except Rhinelander as well as Stanley-Boyd, Stratford and Wittenberg- Birnamwood with the top four finishers in each event advancing to the June 17 sectional at Osceola.
Monday’s meet starts with field events at 3:30 p.m. Track events get underway at 4:15 p.m.
“We’ll see a lot of the same teams again so we’ll know what we’re up against,” Sullivan said. “We’re looking forward to it. Here’s our time to shine. We have a lot of athletes who are ready to bring it Monday.”
As the boys and girls competed simultaneously in Tuesday’s 3,200-meter run, Medford’s Jack Tlusty and Alicia Kawa are on their way to personal-best times and thirdplace and second-place finishes in their respective races.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS
Medford’s Brenley Beran gets high over this hurdle during the 100-meter race at Tuesday’s GNC meet. She got the eighth-place point in the event.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS
