English Valleys continues improvement at Pekin track

The boys’ track team from English Valleys likes to run at Pekin, they made that clear when they opened their outdoor season there and finished in third place. They continued to stick to their strengths of long distance and hurdles when they headed back to Pekin’s track on April 5, this time finishing in sixth place.

    “We’re ahead of where we were a year ago already,” English Valleys coach Becky Becker said.

    It’s still early in the season but Jacob Glandon and Clayton Moore have emerged to be two of the Bears’ leaders on the track. Glandon has finished at or near the top in multiple events already and did so again in the long-distance races. In the 1600m run, Glandon crossed the finish line third, behind two Pekin competitors, with a time of 5:21.93. He followed that up with a runner-up finish in the 3200m run, picking up eight points with his time of 11:01.20.

    Moore was able to do his part for the Bears, finishing first in the 400-meter hurdles with a time of 1:01.18. Coming into the meet his average sat around 1:03.00, dropping his time down nearly two seconds. He has been able to win the event both times he has run it thus far at Pekin and will continue to be a catalyst for the other Bear hurdlers.

    English Valleys put together another positive result in the distance medley, finishing middle of the pack in fourth-place with a time of 4:12.50. They also finished fourth in the 4x400-meter relay (4:09.39) and fourth in the 4x800-meter relay (11:00.62).

    “For the most part these guys did as well as or better than what I expected them to do,” Becker said. “I was extremely pleased, we did some good things.”

    Other results are as follows:

    100-meter dash: Cooper Andreassen took seventh (12.98), Tommy Stecklein finished ninth (13.49)

    200-meter dash: Seth Thompson took sixth (25.94), Caleb Peach finished seventh (26.56)

    400-meter dash: Nolan Grove finished fifth (59.93)

    800-meter run: John Fisher took fifth (2:27.71), Raif Axmear finished eighth (2:53.03)

    110-meter hurdles: Cael Hester finished sixth (21.01)

    4x100-meter relay: English Valleys finished fifth (50.25)

    4x200-meter relay: English Valleys finished sixth (1:47.35)

    800 sprint-medley: English Valleys finished sixth (1:55.41)

    4x100 meter shuttle hurdle: English Valleys finished sixth (1:21.37)

    Long Jump: Jacob Glandon finished seventh (15’-3.75”)

    Shot Put: Jacob Jackson took seventh (36’-6.00”), John Fisher finished 10th (34’-6.00”)

    Discus: John Fisher took 10th (90’-9.00”), Derek Dulaney finished 11th (85’-7.00”)

    “I’m still trying to figure out our 4x400 team, but I was very happy with how they ran,” Becker said. “The handoffs in the 4x100 were spot on tonight, it’s something I’ve been disappointed with in the past.”

    The Bears had their next meet cancelled, pushing back their next chance of competition to April 17 at BGM.