Inside, outside and out of state …
District 10 had about all of the directional bases covered in Saturday's track and field finale.
Looking to consolidate its AA and AAA championships, the district covering all or parts of seven counties in northwest Pennsylvania chose to go west into Ohio, competing at an Olympic Training Center about 25 miles from the state line.
“District 10 wanted to look at a meet where they could host AA and AAA rather than taking the kids out of school," meet director John Wilson said of the challenge facing district officials. “It was kind of tough, we had a couple venues that we used to count on that just didn't pan out this year. The colleges were busy, … and the venues wouldn't meet a AA/AAA contest.
“(The district) came here for swimming, and (officials) knew they had an outstanding track facility. They saw the indoor facility in use, and they met with (track director) Charlie Powell and got a price that seemed to fit into the district budget and they could do it in one day. This is the first time we've had AA and AAA without preliminaries leading to it. One venue, one time, one place."
Featuring one of the finest indoor track facilities anywhere, the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio, appeared to meet the district's and athlete's needs in what was called “an experiment" by Wilson. And the move into a neighboring state is not new for a district in Pennsylvania, the meet director said.
“It's been done before, it's been done over in the eastern part of the state going into New Jersey," he said. “(The PIAA) said yes, if you vote that way. There was some dissent, nobody likes change and going into Ohio when they think everything can be done here, but this has everything we were looking for in a AA and AAA event.
“We're trying this one time and see how it goes. We'll talk to the coaches and see what they think and the district committee, and we'll see what happens next year."
With threatening skies the order of the day and rain hit or miss throughout the meet, the world-class multi-sport complex opened the doors to its one-of-a-kind indoor track and field venue for the high jump and pole vault competitions.
“I'm very pleased," Wilson said of facility officials offering to move the two jumps inside at a moment's notice on event day. “They'll do anything to make sure these kids get a fair competition."
Performance-wise, McDowell's Caleb Sanford benefited from the climate-controlled environment inside at SPIRE as his pursuit of a New Balance Nationals Outdoor (NBNO) qualifying mark came to an end. Entering the AAA event at 12 feet, 9 inches with only one other vaulter competing, Sanford cleared his opening height and 13-9 on his initial attempts. After needing a second try at 14-3, the senior skipped ahead to the NBNO entry mark of 15-3.5 and cleared on his first run. His day ended with a trio of misses at 15-8.5.
“At my high school, we have both an outdoor and indoor facility so this last two weeks we haven't had any competitions so we have been switching back and forth, out and in, due to the weather or not," Sanford said of competing inside SPIRE on Saturday. “So I have been jumping inside all season, and I didn't have any problems with (switching inside)."
As they have for years, Hickory dominated the boys and girls throws. In the AA boys' shot put, sophomore Evan Blaire moved to PA#3 at 57-10.75, while teammate Austin Aikins was second in a PA#5 56-4. In the discus, Blaire moved to PA#10 with his winning throw of 163-7, while Danielle Collier had a PR and PA#3 156-5 to claim the girls' javelin.
On the track, Villa Maria won all but one of the non-hurdle events and a pair of relays in AA girls, with Claire Brown holding off Kristina Junkin of Iroquois in a tight 800 and Alison Carson claiming the 1,600 and 3,200 runs.
Hannah Drake of Wilmington score a huge PR and victory in the AA triple jump with a T-PA#4 38-5, while Abby Jones of Franklin Area won the AAA high jump at 5-7 along with the long jump.