The Escalante High School boys and girls track and field teams began their season with strong showings March 21 at the Jemez Valley Invitational.
The boys finished third in the team standings, scoring 58 points in the 10-team field. Cuba was first with 82.5 points, while Mesa Vista took second with 62 points.
The Lady Lobos also took third with 70 points and were in first place for much of the meet. Only 4.5 points separated first place from third place in the girls competition. Navajo Pine was first with 74.5 points, while Cuba finished second with 73 points.
“Now all the hard work during practice is paying off,” Escalante assistant coach Diego Brusuelas said. “The kids were getting tired of practice and were saying, ‘All we do is run.’”
Escalante brought 47 athletes (boys and girls) to Jemez Valley.
“I’m really proud of them,” Escalante coach Thomas Royston said.
The boys were paced by junior Justin Atencio, who took first in the javelin with a heave of 142 feet, 3.5 inches. Atencio also took third in the triple jump.
The Escalante girls 800-meter relay team of Bryanna Gallegos, Annah Martinez, Gerica Martinez and Jenna Rhoads took first place, and Rose Julian won the triple jump for Escalante.
Dulce boys coach Ron Graham was impressed with the number of athletes Escalante had at Jemez. Graham’s own team is down to 18 athletes after he lost 10 team members to poor grades. Dulce is the defending District 2AA champion, which includes Escalante, Coronado and Navajo Prep.
“I’m not dwelling on what I don’t have,” Graham said. “I’m looking forward to what I do have.”
One of the things he discovered he does have is a good 1600-meter relay team. The 1600 relay was the final event at Jemez and Dulce won going away with a time of 3:45, just five seconds off the state-qualifying time.
The team of Jared Pesata, Jorge Velarde, along with twins Bryan and Jaymes Panzy, had not run together before the meet.
“I’d run them all in the 400-meter run at Piedra Vista (March 14),” Graham said. “I looked at the sheet and realized that was 4X4 relay.”
Dulce finished sixth in the boy’s team standings with 45 points.
The Dulce girls team finished seventh with 32.5 points. The Lady Hawks already have one state-qualifier in freshman Kyetiil Vicenti, who cleared 4 feet, 11 inches at Piedra Vista March 14 to better the qualifying standard by one inch. She took first at Jemez with a jump of 4 feet, 9 inches and won the 300-meter hurdles.
The Mesa Vista boys team was without basketball players Jaime Cruz Jr. and Kris Buzzard, who have not yet joined the team. Coach Ben Sandoval was pleased with the Trojans’ showing nonetheless.
“We have the potential to do really well if nobody gets hurt,” he said.
Mesa Vista senior Zach Woolems was a double winner at Jemez, winning both the high jump and the 300-meter hurdles. Ben Sandoval’s son, Benjamin Sandoval, won the 800-meter run and Adrian Coronado took first in the 400-meter run. Coronado finished the meet as the boys high-point scorer with 19 points.
The Mesa Vista girls team was sixth with 36 points. Julia Martinez won the 800-meter run with a time of 2:40, just four seconds away from the state-qualifying time of 2:36. Martinez also took second in the 200-meter run and the high jump. She added a third-place finish in the 100-meter run.
Freshman Hailey Lucero turned in a state-qualifying time in the 3200-meter run, coming in second with a time of 12:44, easily breaking the 12:55 qualifying standard. She also took third in the 1600-meter run.
The McCurdy Bobcats finished ninth in the boys team standings with 12 points, seven of which came courtesy of freshman Louie Martinez, who won the long jump with a leap of 19 feet, 6 inches.
McCurdy’s girls scored four points to finish ninth.
McCurdy coach Cecil Brown enjoyed his return to the track. He had previously served as McCurdy’s track coach in 1997 and was McCurdy’s football coach until 2002. He is currently an assistant football coach, too.
“Getting an old guy out of retirement, I’m very proud of the kids and what they did,” he said. “I see better things ahead.”