Three Cook County High School track athletes headed down to the Minnesota Class A track meet at Hamline University last weekend: Molly Zafft in her first-ever appearance and returning State competitors Kieran Scannell and Ailee Larson. Left: Senior Ailee Larson finished strong in the 800-meter finals at the Class A State Track Meet, June 11, capturing 4th place. Above: Sophomore Kieran Scannell stayed in the middle of the pack on the first lap of his 1600-meter run at the State finals, June 11th, at Hamline University. He went on to capture 7th place in this race and earn a medal.
Three Cook County High School track athletes headed down to the Minnesota Class A track meet at Hamline University last weekend. The preliminaries for most events were held Friday, June 10 and finals were Saturday, June 11. Track is one of the toughest sports to get to state in. There are about 30 teams in each of the eight sections in the state, only two individuals qualify in each event, and there is no team qualification for state. Since restarting track nine years ago, we had our first qualifiers last year, distance runners Ailee Larson and Kieran Scannell. Both Ailee and Kieran returned this year, along with first-year sprinter Molly Zafft.
The first time you go to State, you are usually just happy to be there. It is the athletic achievement of a lifetime for most high schoolers. If you are fortunate enough to get there more than once, you can then start to aim for a medal-winning performance, generally a top 9 performance. You still have to be very talented, work very hard, and perform under pressure. About 300 motivated athletes start at the section level in each event—16 go to state. The stands are packed at Hamline with coaches, family, friends and track fans – pretty nerve-wracking.
Larson in with personal best
First up Friday was Ailee in the 800 meter, ½ mile. She came in as the No. 9 seed (had the 9th best time of the Section qualifiers), but we knew she was capable of a better performance, since she wasn’t pushed to the limit at Sections. Her plan was to go out under control, probably near the back, stay in touch with the main group, and then turn on her sprint in the final stretch. She had to be careful, as the top two in each of the two heats, plus the next 5 fastest times from either heat qualified for finals – and the first heat had gone very fast. She went out right according to plan, sitting in 6th with a half lap to go, although back a 10-yard gap from the top 3. Coming around the final curve to the long straightaway, she kicked it in, and it was a thing of beauty. She blew by the two in front of her and slowly reeled in the top 3— the most exciting finish of the day. She won the heat in 2:19.4, a personal best, but behind three in the first heat. She was in.
Larson and Scannell both had great finishes at the state track meet last weekend. Not only did they run personal bests, each set a school record in their events.
First year at State for Zafft
Soon after, it was Molly’s turn. She came into the 200-meter dash as one of the lower seeds, having made a huge improvement just to get to state, and was in her first year of track; so we didn’t know exactly what to expect. At least the strategy for the 200 is pretty easy – run fast all the way. At the gun, she got out of the starting blocks a little slow. She was unable to close the gap, finishing in 27.54 seconds, about 0.7 below her best, although there was a headwind to the finish. It was, of course, a big disappointment for her to come in second to last, but this is state meet, after all. And her teammates can relate to it, Ailee fell in the preliminaries last year and didn’t finish, and Kieran came in sick last year and was 2nd to last. The true measure of this junior sprinter will be her response to the disappointment next year, not the fact she didn’t do as well as she hoped this year.
PR finish for Scannell
Kieran didn’t have to run preliminaries Friday, as they do the 1 and 2 miles as finals only. He came in as the number 7 seed in the mile, but we knew he would have run a lot faster than his 4:33 PR to place, as many of the top runners had saved themselves at their section meets. We also had a pretty good idea how the race would go, since most of these guys were back from last year, and many had run the 2-mile Friday. They generally take it out at a fair pace, and then drop the hammer about half way. At that point, the group fractures into a couple small groups, and your fate is set. It is almost impossible to bridge the gaps alone when you are running at PR pace already. Kieran executed the strategy perfectly. At ½ mile, the push came and he was in the top 8 group. One of that group dropped, Kieran hung on, then just missed moving up a couple places with a big push at the end. Still, he was in the medals in 7th with an 8 second PR of 4:25 that broke Danny Marks’ CCHS record from the 1970s by 3 seconds.
Season ends with “photo finish”
Finally, Ailee returned to the track for the 800 final. We also had a pretty good idea how that would go out – fast. The leaders from Friday had run the first 200 in 30 seconds flat yesterday, almost as fast as the boys. Ailee would have to walk a careful line, keep in touch with the pack, but not kill herself too early. She quickly dropped near the back of the pack, but that was still very fast at 65 seconds for the first lap. She was obviously tired by the end of the first lap. She hung tight, and caught a couple of fading girls on the back stretch, then slowly moved to set up a sprint. It was tough, as she moved past two more girls, and then closed in on second and third place. We knew she was 3rd or 4th, but it was too close to call. In fact, she had the same time to the 100th of a second as the 3rd place runner – a PR 2:18.78, and was only 2/10ths of a second out of 2nd. The photo finish went to the other girl, but no complaints, 4th place at state in nothing to complain about!
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