Maine Athletes Shine At NSAF Meet of Champions
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina was the place to be this weekend as the National Scholastic Athletics Foundation (NSAF) hosted the USA Meet of Champions at the Doug Shaw Memorial Stadium. With the Maine high school outdoor track and field season set to open practices on Monday, March 29th several athletes from around the state made the trip down to South Carolina to open up their spring seasons.
Old Town's Izabelle Trefts the defending Class B 1600m racewalk champion opened up the action on the track in the 3000 meter racewalk championship. Trefts finished in third place with a 16:15.81 effort.
York's Alexandra Brent had a busy weekend on the track. Brent opened with the emerging elite 110m hurdle trials running a personal best 15.62 to place third in heat two, her time advanced her to the finals. Brent clocked 16.16 in the final good for sixth place overall. Alexandra returned to the track on Saturday evening in the championship 4x800 relay running with her club team New England Elite to split a 2:19.81 on the second leg to help her squad to a runner-up finish in 9:18.59. On Sunday Brent was back on the track for the championship 800m where she would finish third in an outdoor personal best of 2:17.37
Scarborough junior Zach Barry ran an impressive race in the emerging elite mile to finish fourth. Barry opened with the first 800m in 2:14.03 and was positioned in fourth place. He covered the penultimate lap in 66.38 before kicking home in 61.23 over the final four hundred meters to clock a personal best 4:21.82. Barry returned on Sunday to compete in the championship 800m race where he finished sixth overall in 1:57.01.
On Saturday Falmouth senior Karley Piers competed in the emerging elite two mile. Piers showed little rust as she moved her way up throughout the pack moving into second with 1200m to go and finishing with a personal best 11:09.78. She recorded splits of 5:36.58 for the mile and 5:33.24 for the second mile.
Closing out the weekend was senior Ben Greene of Falmouth in the championship mile. Greene opened the first lap in 63.39 and came through 800m in 2:10.21, after covering the third lap in 67.88 he was able to close the last lap in a strong 63.82 to finish in a time of 4:21.90 which was good for seventh place.