From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank

The Rowan men blasted a season-best 3:14.28 in the 1,600-meter relay Wednesday at the All-Atlantic Championships at SUNY Cortland.

Sophomore Justin Bishop of Mainland Regional ran a 47.67 anchor for the Profs.

Schalick graduate Chris Mesiano, a senior, led off, followed by sophomore Vincent Delle of Old Bridge and Airrion Scott of Ewing setting up Bishop.

Rowan placed second behind NYU, which set a meet record of 3:13.97, breaking Rowan’s record of 3:14.45 set last year with Bishop and Delle in the lineup.

Rowan’s previous-best time this year was a 3:16.26 at the Penn Relays.

Rowan’s time is No. 11 in NCAA Division 3 going into NCAA nationals.

 

Rowan’s Tyler Garland, a Deptford High graduate, continued his terrific sophomore season Wednesday afternoon with a PR in the high hurdles and the top qualifying time into the finals of the All-Atlantic Region Championships.

Garland ran a legal 14.28 on the SUNY Cortland track to lead all qualifiers into the finals.

Garland won the first of three heats by more than half a second over Oneonta freshman Nick Michalowski, who ran 14.88. The next-fastest qualifier was Eddie Mahana, a junior at St. John Fisher, who ran 14.39 in the third and final heat.

Garland’s time is No. 3 in NCAA Division 3.

His previous PR was 14.30 at a meet in Orlando back in March, but that was wind-aided. His previous wind-legal PR was a 14.31 at a different meet in Orlando in March.

Earlier this month, Garland won his second NJAC title in the highs. He’s also run as fast as 54.09 this spring in the 400 intermediates.

The All-Atlantic 110-meter finals at SUNY Cortland are scheduled for 1:10 p.m. Thursday.

It doesn’t count. But it was really fast.

St. Augustine senior Sincere Rhea, the indoor national scholastic champion, made the long trip to the 52nd annual Glenn Loucks Invite at White Plains (N.Y.) High School, where he ran the third-fastest time in New Jersey history in the 110-meter high hurdles.

Rhea, racing in Lane 4, exploded out of the blocks and took command of the race coming off the first hurdle. He ran away from the field, winning in 13.52, then clapped his hands when he saw the scoreboard at the finish line reading an unofficial 13.55.

Second place was a full second behind.

He kept running beyond the finish line and through an opening in a fence well beyond the track.

The wind-reading of 3.1, however, was well over the legal limit of 2.0 meters per second, so the performance technically isn’t eligible for records and all-time lists.

However, most marks on the all-time New Jersey lists were recorded without wind gauges, so people who keep lists generally include all marks. Otherwise, athletes would be penalized for competing in meets with a wind gauge.

In any case, Rhea has a wind-legal PR of 13.68 from the trials of the South Jersey Invitational last Thursday at Delsea.

That mark is No. 3 nationally this year. The 13.52 is fastest under any conditions in the country this year.

Rhea ran 13.81 in the trials with a legal wind of 1.2 meters per second, so if you’re a stickler for these things, that will be considered the meet record.

http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/417522/27888064/1524067828850/Loucks+Top+10+After+2017.pdf?token=Q9c9htEWu06IzdJdMdH98ehuVRw%3D

The only times under any conditions faster than Rhea’s in New Jersey history were turned in by Camden’s Dayne Brown, who set the state record of 13.43 in 1999, and Cory Poole of East Orange, who ran 13.46 in 2017. Todd Matthews of Notre Dame also ran 13.52, back in 1998.

ALL-TIME N.J. HIGH HURDLES LIST
13.43 … Danye Brown [Camden], 1999
13.46 … Cory Poole [East Orange Campus], 2017
13.52 … Sincere Rhea [St. Augustine], 2019
13.52 … Todd Matthews [Notre Dame], 1998
13.59 … Gerard Reynolds [Willingboro], 1990
13.62 … Christopher Stephens [Plainfield], 2001
13.66 … Sultan Tucker [Delsea], 1997
13.66 … Emmanuel Deux [Linden], 2001
13.67 … Jermaine Collier [Trenton], 2012
13.70 … Chris Alexander [Christian Brothers], 2015

(Author’s note: I can tell you for a fact this isn’t the first time a huge performance has been negated by a wind reading at the Glenn Loucks Invitational. At the 1978 meet, a triple jumper named Sanya Owolabi from Sleepy Hollow High School just north of White Plains jumped 53-something and broke the national scholastic record, but the wind was barely over the 2.0 limit at 2.1. I know this because tthe person working the wind gauge that day was an injured White Plains distance runner (me). The entire Sleepy Hollow track program raced over and began screaming at me, but I stuck to my guns and that mark is still listed in the record books as wind-assisted. Owolabi did eventually break the national record with a jump of 53-3 1/2 at the old IPI national championships in Naperville, Ill.)

Big night Monday for Oakcrest graduate Kierston Johnson, who won the 100 at the Swarthmore Last-Chance Qualifier with a PR of 12.40 with a legal wind.

Johnson, a Rowan freshman, entered the meet with a collegiate PR of 12.57 from last weekend’s NJAC meet at Stockton University. She won the second of three sections and finished first overall in a field of 19 women.

She finished 5-100ths-of-a-second ahead of Sara Arbogast of Susquehanna in her race. Lusmer Quintana of Ithaca, who won the first section, was second overall in 12.45.

Johnson’s overall PR until Monday night was a 12.46 from the 2017 Cape Atlantic Championships at Bridgeton, where she placed second to Neyshka Garcia Perez of Absegami, who ran 12.38.

Johnson was a three-time state Group 3 sprint medalist at Oakcrest and also a 17-foot long jumper.

Another huge steeplechase race for Elizabethtown junior Samuel Gerstenbacher of Schalick Monday night in cold, rainy conditions at the Swarthmore Last-Chance Meet.

Gerstenbacher beat a field of 30 runners in the 3,000-meter steeple in a personal-best 9:00.21. He finished 20 meters ahead of second-place Greg Jaindl of Moravian, who PR’d in 9:03.89.

Gerstenbacher’s time is No. 4 this year in NCAA Division 3, and Jaindl’s is No. 7.

Gerstenbacher broke his own school record of 9:08.71, which he ran at the Penn Relays. Before that it was 9:11.20 from the same Swarthmore meet last spring.

So he’s dropped 11 seconds off his PR in the last month.

Gerstenbacher tripled at the Landmark Conference Championships earlier this month at Goucher College in Baltimore, cruising to wins in the 1,500 in 3:59.02, the 5,000 in 15:08.09 and the steeple in 9:27.35. Jaindl finished second in all three races. They also finished 1-2 in the Landmark Conference XC Championships this past fall and in the 3,000 at the indoor conference meet.

Next for Gerstenbacher is the NCAA Division 3 Championships May 23-25 at SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio, outside Cleveland. The steeplechase qualifying rounds are scheduled for 5:50 p.m. that Thursday, May 23, with the finals following at 11:45 a.m. two days later.

Gerstenbacher ran 1:56.33, 4:20.31 and 9:40.31 at Schalick. He ran one steeplechase, at the 2016 Woodbury Relays, with no water jump, and took third in 9:47.30

Collingswood High School graduate Adam Hunt won the discus and placed second in the hammer and shot put, Paulsboro’s Edgar Rosa won the javelin and Josh Varghese of Williamstown won the shot and led a 1-2-3 sweep of the top three spots as the Rowan College Gloucester County throwing team led the Roadrunners to their second straight NJCAA Division 3 national championship.

The Deptford Township school, formerly Gloucester County College, scored 69 points in the four throws.

Rowan College Gloucester County outscored second-place Suffolk Community College of Selden, N.Y., 131-115. Harper College of Palatine, Ill. (104) and Triton College of River Grove, Ill., (100) were the only other schools nationally to outscore RCGC’s throwers.

Varghese, Hunt and Adetomiwa Awogbamila of Pitman swept the top three spots in the shot. Rosa won the javelin. Hunt, Varghese and Rosa went 2-3-4 in the hammer.

Deptford High graduate Glenn Abott won the 110-meter high hurdles in 15.08, out-racing second-place Marquise Young of Camden County College via Sterling High School. Young also took second in the intermediates in 55.51.

Also for Rowan, Mike Dowd of Williamstown won the steeplechase in a hand-timed 9:54.7. Devonte Watson of Winslow was third in the intermediates with a 56.87, Derek Gatling of Kingsway jumped 22-8 for third in the long jump.

For Rowan College Gloucester County’s women’s team, Delsea graduate Elisia Lancaster won the hammer (170-11), shot put (43-5 1/4) and discus (126-1). Emily Hilt of Kingsway was second in both the hammer and shot.

The meet was held at something called MVCC Track in Utica, N.Y.

Here are the results. Have fun converting all the field marks: https://d2o2figo6ddd0g.cloudfront.net/w/y/gwbjbyz41d0uw0/results.pdf

 

Allison Reuter of Clayton, a senior at Widener, won the hammer throw at the Middle Atlantic Conference Championships with a throw of 168-4 at her home facility in Chester, Pa.

It was her fourth MAC title and third in a row in the hammer.

Reuter threw 168-4 on her final attempt and won by nearly seven feet over Taylor Runo of King’s (Pa.) College in Wilkes-Barre, who threw 161-9. Reuter actually had the two-best throws of the competition with a 162-9 prior to her winning throw.

Reuter also placed sixth in the discus.

Reuter PR’d in March with a bomb of 175-2 at the Danny Curran Invite at West Chester’s Farrell Stadium, where she actually had three throws over 170 feet and won by more than 25 feet.

The conference title was Reuter’s third. She won the hammer throw last spring at 168-8 and the spring of 2017 at 148-5 and also won the weight throw this past winter at 53-9 1/4 at the indoor MAC meet at Lehigh’s Rauch Fieldhouse in Bethlehem in February.

Reuter ranks ninth in NCAA Division 3 with that 175-2. That broke her own school record of 173-6, which she set last year. Reuter is also fifth in school history in the discus at 128-4 back in 2017. It’s also a MAC record.

Reuter threw Monday night at the Swarthmore Last-Chance meet and threw 157-0 in cold, rainy conditions for second place.

At Clayton, Reuter was focused on the discus and javelin, since New Jersey high school track doesn’t have a hammer throw. She took second to Palmyra’s Tamara Carmichael in the 2015 state Group 1 meet in the discus with a throw of 123-10, which was her high school discus PR. She did win a sectional discus title as a junior back in 2014 with a throw of 101-2.

Reuter will compete at the All-Atlantic Region Track and Field Conference Championships at SUNY Cortland, which begins Wednesday.

It’s been 25 years since a Delran runner recorded a double win at the Burlington County Open, and with his lanky build, long stride and explosion out of the blocks, Miekel House looks a LOT like the great Brandon Jenkins, the last to do it.

In 1994, Jenkins was a Delran sophomore when he won the 200 in 22.1 and 400 in 48.9 at the County Open. He went on to win the Meet of Champions 200 that spring in 21.46, but his promising career was sadly cut short before he could reach his full potential.

House won both dashes easily Saturday at Rancocas Valley, unpressed in 10.88 in the 100 and coasting to a 22.39 in a two-man final section of the 200 after a bunch of scratches.

House became the first Delran boy to win the 100 at the County Open since Todd Lowber — who went on to become an NCAA Division 3 high jump national champion and Dallas Cowboys tight end — in 2001. He’s the first to win the 200 since Jenkins in 1994.

Next spring, House will have the chance to become the first sprinter to double the County Open 100 and 200 in back-to-back years since Louis Smith of Burlington Township in 1996 and 1997.

House, a Delran junior, is only the fifth Delran boy to double at the County Open and the first to do it on the track since Jenkins a quarter of a century ago:

1991 – Andre Fisher [183-3 javelin, 6-4 HJ]
1994 – Brondon Jenkins [22.1 200, 48.9 400]
2001 – Todd Lowber [10.78 100, 6-6 HJ
2011 – Dennis Fields [22-5 LJ, 43-0 3/4 TJ]
2019 – Miekel House [10.88 100, 22.39 200]

House had a promising sophomore year, running as fast as 10.82 at sectionals, where he was second to Pleasantville’s Sahmir Jones by 2-100ths of a second, and taking third in the 200 in 22.08, which remains his 200 PR. He went on to take second at Group 2 states in the 100 and third in the 200.

House PR’d this spring in the 100 with a 10.81 in the trials of the South Jersey Invite before taking second in the final with a 10.84, 1-100th of a second behind Clayton’s Thomas Hampton.

House is now No. 11 on the all-time Burlington County 100-meter dash list.  That list is below.

He’s No. 5 in the state in the 100 and No. 2 in South Jersey, and No. 4 in S.J. in the 200. He’s also ranked No. 1 in the state in Group 2 in the 100 and fourth in the 200. But you get the feeling that 200 time is ready to come down in the right race and conditions.

Next for House and Delran is the BCSL Championships this weekend at Willingboro.

ALL-TIME BURLCO 100-METER DASH LIST
10.45 … James Townsend (Holy Cross), 2003
10.62 … Kashif Moore (Burlington Twp.), 2007
10.66 … Bobby Orro (Pemberton), 1994
10.72 … Sterling Pierce [Rancocas Valley], 2015
10.5h … Carl Lewis (Willingboro), 1979
10.5h … Brondon Jenkins (Delran), 1979
10.5h … Ken Reynolds (Willingoro), 1985, 1986
10.5h … Malik Crawford (Willingboro), 1988
10.75 … Jamaal Harris (Palmyra), 2002
10.78 … Michael Bolling (Willingboro), 2000
10.81 … Miekel House [Delran], 2019
10.86 … Daequan Kim(Bordentown), 2009
10.87 … Jashuan Spady (Pemberton), 2009
10.87 … Koree Dusenbury (Burlington Twp.), 2011
10.88 … Ben Longjohn [Shawnee], 2017

Yarayah Hawkins dropped a huge PR in the Camden County Championships, winning the large-school 800 in 1:55.96.

Hawkins’ previous PR was a 1:57.14 last weekend at the South Jersey Invitational, where he took third. Before that it was 1:57.77 from last spring’s S.J. Invite.

Hawkins’ is now Highland’s fastest 800 runner in 17 years, since Ayo Owodunni ran 1:55.93 at the 2002 Meet of Champions. Actually, Jamal Davis in 2008 and Jamil Jackson in 2014 both also ran exactly 1:55.96, oddly enough.

That 1:55.96 ranks No. 14 in the state this year and No. 4 by a South Jersey half-miler, behind only Pleasantville junior Gabriel Moronta (1:55.00), Haddonfield senior Derek Gess (1:55.13) and Haddonfield senior Ethan Spellmeyer (1:55.74).

Hawkins led four runners under 1:57 in a very fast race at Haddon Township.

Bishop Eustace senior Connor Melko was second in 1:56.47, Spellmeyer ran 1:56.83 for third and Haddonfield junior Andrew Gostovich was fourth in 1:56.87. The times were big PRs for Melko, a 9:06 two-miler, and Gostovich as well.

Hawkins is now No. 2 in the state in Group 3, behind only Hopewell Valley’s Sean Dolan, who ran 1:52.81 at the Mercer County Championships. Dolan ran 1:50.74 last year.

Hawkins also placed third in the 1,600 with a 4:26.77 and ran on Highland’s third-place 1,600-meter relay.

Next up for Hawkins is the Tri-County Conference meet at Delsea on Wednesday.

Tom Long dropped another huge PR this weekend at the IC4A Championships at Princeton’s Weaver Stadium.

Long, a Rider junior from Cinnaminson, ran 1:51.73 off a 54.69 first lap to shave more than 1 1/2 seconds off his 800 PR of 1:53.31, which he ran last month at the Larry Ellis Invite on the same track.

“Long ran great today,” said Rider coach Bob Hamer, the 1989 Pennsylvania Class AAA XC champ for Council Rock. “He finally got into a race that went and he took full advantage of the opportunity. He has done a great job this year and I’m looking forward to a great senior year.”

Until a few weeks ago, Long’s PR was 1:54.29 from last year’s MAAC Championships on his home track in Lawrenceville.

Long’s time is No. 6 in Rider history, just behind Chris Tarello in 1994. Tarello, a 1992 Shawnee graduate, now coaches the women’s distance powerhouse at Monmouth University.

Here’s what that Rider all-time top-10 looks like:

1:49.52 … Greg Wesh, 2010
1:50.38 … Jonathan Jackson, 2017
1:50.62 … Chris Gonzalez, 2011
1:50.68 … Marc McKithen, 1995
1:51.22 … Chris Tarello, 1994
1:51.73 … Tom Long, 2019
1:51.80 … Greg Calhoun, 1991
1:52.16 … Ken Lehman, 1980
1:52.34 … Anthony Ardino, 2018
1:52.40 … Darien Edwards, 2016

Long’s high school PR was a 1:55.49 at Group 2 states in the spring of 2015. He’s now lowered his PR nearly four seconds since he arrived on Rte. 206.