BY WENDI REARDON PRICE
Clarkston News Sports Writer
The Clarkston High School Track & Field teams are prepping for the end of the season starting with top finishes in the league at the OAA Red Championships this Friday.
The teams recently headed to Oxford where they split the day.
The girls team won their meet at Oxford last Wednesday as they took first place in 13 events, 86-42.
“We had a lot of good performances from our hurdlers, from our long jumpers,” said Kevin Breen, head coach. “Our field events did really well. We have seen a lot of improvement from them.”
For hurdles, Haley Puskar finished in first place in the 100-meter hurdles, 17.24; and third place in the 300-meter hurdles, 49.38. Shae Harbaugh finished in first place in the 300-meter hurdles, 49.04.
For field events, Clarkston took the top three places in the long jump with Trinity Roodbeen in first place, 15-07; and Alex Touchstone and Alana Watlington both finishing with 15-05 for second and third places.
Molly Nicholson finished in first place in the shot put, 30-01.75, and Piper Bosart finished in third place with her throw finishing with the distance of 28-09.75. Alysa Perez threw 83-02 in discus in a third place finish. Allison Osborn finished in first place in the high jump, 4-06.
For relay events, Clarkston finished in first place, 53.82, and third place, 58.68 in the 400-meter relay. They also topped Oxford in the 800-meter relay, 1:51.56; the 1,600-meter relay, 4:17.77; and the 3,200-meter relay, 10:18.62 for first place finishes.
For sprints, the girls took the top three places in the 100-meter dash. Allie Eriksen finished in first place, 13:30; Danielle Hermansen, second, 14:07; and Sam Aris, third, 14:30. In the 200-meter dash, Callie Dickens finished first at 27.59, and Eriksen finished in second, 27.91. Eriksen also finished in second place in the 400-meter dash at 1:01.22 and Amanda Sutherby finished in third, 1:10.69.
“Sprinters had a little bit of a rough day,” Breen added. “The sprinters did what they needed to do to score points.”
For long distance, the girls finished in first place in the 800-meter run with Mallory Ferguson finishing at 2:29.49; in the 1,600-meter run with Ferguson, 5:26.34; and the 3,200-meter run with Grace Nolan, 11:37.73. Emily Gustafson finished in second place in the 800-meter run, 2:35.86.
“We have a couple of injuries right now so we held some of the girls out of racing,” Breen said. “We ran three of our girls – Grace, Elizabeth and Mallory. Between those three girls we were able to win the distance events and overall in the score did really good.”
The boys lost their meet against Oxford, 71-57.
For sprints, the boys took the top three places in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes. Max Salter led the way in the 100-meter, finishing in first place at 11.75 as Michael Fluegel took second, 11.86, and Conor Donahue took third, 12.14. Grant Telfer finished first in the 200-meter dash at 23.29 as Salter finished in second, 23.85, and Jarod Rutenber finished third, 24.45. In the 400-meter dash, Matthew Baker finished in second, 54.13, and Alec Ryan finished in third, 54.46.
“Our sprinters did what they needed to do,” Breen said.
For long distance, Brendan Favazza finished in first in the 3,200-meter run, 10:03.17, and Nathan Sesti finished in third place in the 800-meter run, 2:05.45.
“Our distance boys struggled a little bit,” said Breen. “Oxford has a really good distance program and their kids are really solid right now. We ended up locking points in the distance events. We probably could have gotten a few more if I had adjusted a few things.”
For hurdles, Clarkston finished in third place in both events as Ronan McLaughlin finished at 18.70 in the 110-meter and Peyton Miller finished at 46.46 in the 300-meter hurdles.
For relay events, the 400-meter relay teams finished in first, 44.56, and second, 48.30; the 800-meter relay teams finished in first, 1:34.14, and third 1:43.99. The 1,600-meter relay teams also finished in first and third place at 3:40.64 and 3:58.82. The 3,200-meter relay teams finished in second, 8:25.59, and third, 9:11.41.
For field events, Gino Paese finished in first in the long jump, 20-01, and Josh Kelley finished in third, 19-02.5. For the high jump, Jayden Hutchons finished in second place and Matthew Nicholson finished in third, 5-08. Paese finished in third place in the shot put, 42-05.75, and Ben Haas finished in third in the discus, 124-06.
“We did well in our field events,” Breen added. “Our shot putters did more than they have done in the past. They are really showing a lot of improvement. High jumpers did well.”
He added it was senior night for Oxford and Clarkston was holding award night for the seniors.
Clarkston opened the week against Rochester Adams on Monday. They head to the OAA Red Championships at Oxford High School. The first event starts at 4:30 p.m.
“We haven’t really seen Adams head to head at all,” Breen said. “I am kind of curious what they will show up with. They’ve got a few good distance runners. They have always had strong hurdlers. Really we are just trying to get prepared for the end of the season now and prepare for our championship meet.”

  Clarkston Track and Field