March 29, 2024

Cardinal girls finish in sixth place at Dutch Invite

PELLA — The Newton girls tack team traveled to Pella on Monday to compete in the annual Dutch invitational. It was a terrific sunny day full of plenty of solid Cardinal performances. Despite their sixth place finish, the Cardinals had a soild showing with nine place-winners making up the 44 Newton points.

The first Cardinal highlight came in the 400-meter dash, in which Sydney Jenkins took second place with a personal-best time of 1:10.10. Alexis Desplanque followed up that solid performance with one of her own in the 800. She ran a 1:32.01, placing her fourth out of 16 girls competing.

In the distance events, Josie Thurmond narrowly missed placing sixth in the 1,500 meter run. Her time of 5:34.10 put in in seventh, just less than three seconds behind the sixth place finisher from South Tama. Amanda Laube finished in sixth place in the 3,000 with a time of 13.35.19, holding off Emmaleah Veldboom from Grinnell who was making a late charge.

Victoria Walton finished in third place in the 100-meter hurdles, timed at 1:18.41. She was barely edged out for second place by BGM's Shealynn Miller, who finished second by one-hundredth of a second. Taylor Moon finished sixth in the 400 hurdles with a time of 1:18.41.

Heading to the relays, the Cards placed second in the 4x400 with a time of 4:11.28. Jenkins and Desplanque were accompanied by teammates Taylor Fisher and freshman Grace Coen on the relay squad. The team's time was a best for Newton this year. The 4x800 team of Hailey Coy, Stephanie Hoebelheinrich, Thurdmond and Rachel Prendergast finished fourth with a time of 11:04.71. The distance medley team took first place by a whopping six seconds with a time of 4:18.31. That team consisted of Walton, Fisher, Coen and Leela Spencer. The final relay team for the Cards was the 4x100 shuttle hurdle team of Bailey Zaruba, Moon, Walton and Taylor Graff. They were timed at 1:12.86.

The next meet for the Cards is scheduled for Thursday in Johnston, where the girls will compete in regionals.