Indoor Track Participates in John Arcaro Invitational
Joe Settineri
On Wednesday January 14, the Homer boy's indoor track and field team participated in the John Arcaro Inviationional at Onondaga Community College. The team did well overall and is exceeding its expectations for this year. Since many of the seniors last year left and a meek amount of other runners returned, the team is composed of a lot of underclassmen and can be described as a young team. The team views itself as having a rebuilding year, but is surprisingly holding its own against other schools. This can be attributed to hard work, a lot of running, and a new weight-lifting program integrated into practice which emphasizes on leg strength. The shot putters, Ben Mortas, Griffin Langhans, and Ryan Parker, posted respectable throws at the meet on the 14th. Mortas launched the shot 36’, Parker threw a 33’ 6” and Langhans threw a 27’ 2.5’. Both Parker and Langans had personal best throws. Long jumpers Nicoli Grihin and Christian Pittsley had impressive marks. Grihin led the jumpers with a jump of 18’ 6.5”, which was a personal best for him in the long jump. Pittsley also had a good jump and posted a 18’ 4” leap. Participating in the triple jump was Logan Grihin and Lucian St. John. Grihin had a solid jump of 37’ 3.75” which landed him 7th place out of 22 and St. John had a jump of 35’ 4.25”. Fifty-five meter hurdlers Nicoli Grihin and Dakota Wagner had times of 9.92 and 10.96 respectively. Nicoli qualified for the league championships in the fifty-five meter hurdles, even though it was only his first time running the event. In the fifty-five meter run, Josh Thompson and Christian Pittsley both had solid times and respectable places. Thompson ran a 7.06 and placed 13th out of 56 while Pittsley ran a 7.20 and placed 23rd out of 56. The 4x400 relay team, which was composed of Lars Roos, Paddy Fox, Michael Morse, and Lucian St. John, placed 16th out of 21. Both Nicoli and Logan Grihin ran the 600 meter dash. Both of the brothers ran solid times, and may have done so well because they were competing against each other. Logan posted the faster time of 1:34.53 with Nicoli right behind him with 1:38.48. Logan qualified for both the sectional and league championship in the 600 meter, which was pretty good for his first time ever running the race. Last but not least the 4x200 relay team wrapped up the meet on a sweet note. They had a placing of 9th and an overall time of 1:42.46. Overall the boys did a good job and continue to improve on strength and experience at the OCC arena.
Photo Credit: Nicoli Grihin and Ashley Wirges
