Sophomore Jessica Berg-Collman (left) is only about 5’4” and weighs 120 pounds but she can throw the shot put a long way! Jessica was one of the three Vikings to qualify for the Section 7A meet where she placed 12th. Molly Zafft (above left) and Peter Warren (above right) both placed 4th in the 100 meters. Molly also placed 4th in the 200 meters and Peter finished 7th in the 200 meters. They are pictured giving it their all in previous events.
Fans of Cook County High School track know that we went to the Section 7A finals with hopes of moving one or both of our talented sprinters, Molly Zafft and Peter Warren, through to the State Meet. Unfortunately, they didn’t make it. It wasn’t for lack of training, effort or skill – they showed plenty of those attributes. I’m probably a bit prejudiced, but track is definitely one of the toughest sports to advance to state. Over 30 teams compete in the section, and there are no teams going to state, only the top two individuals in each event of 14 different events and 4 relays. Not surprisingly, the bigger schools such as Esko, Proctor, Virginia, Crosby-Ironton and International Falls dominate the competition. But we have no complaints. We’ve had competitors at state the last two years, and were definitely in the hunt this year.
Heading down to UMD, we were looking forward to a beautiful day for track. Sunny, 70 degrees with a light breeze, I can’t think of too many things I’d rather be doing. We set up our fan/coaching group on the grass just outside the first curve near the start/ finish. It wasn’t long after we weighedin Jessica Berg-Collman’s shot put (let’s not forget about Jessica, she was our other finals qualifier, but not realistically a state meet threat this year), until Molly settled into her starting blocks for the qualifying race for the 100.
There were two heats of 7, out of which the fastest 8 would come back in an hour to run the finals. Molly was excited, as usual, but not overly nervous. She reacted a little slow at the gun, but opened up a slight lead on the last half of the race, winning her heat in 13.39. The second heat was a little faster, as the favored I-Falls girls pulled two girls from our subsection to a slightly faster qualifying time than Molly. Molly was into the finals with the 4th best time, just off her personal best.
Peter followed immediately afterwards. The boys’ sprint field was extremely deep this year, with top talent from Hinckley, Virginia, Moose Lake and Esko. But Peter, a junior, is very intense and focused, besides being powerful and fast; plus he qualified for sections both of the last two years. He got out very quick at the gun, didn’t get fully relaxed for the last half of the race (there is a fine line in sprinting between being running hard at top speed, but not straining), and ended up 3rd in the heat, 2/100th of a second behind the winner, at a career best of 11.68. On to the finals as the No. 5 qualifier.
Less than an hour later, they were back for the finals. This time Molly got out of the blocks very well, but like Peter’s qualifying race, was a little too tight on the last half of the race. She equaled her time in the preliminaries, but unfortunately also equaled her 4th place finish. Obviously, she was very disappointed, but had a couple hours to wait for the 200. Exploding out of the blocks as he always does, Peter was unfortunately a half step behind the leaders. He relaxed nicely after the drive phase (start) of the race, but ran out of space to catch the leaders. He did end up 4th in an excellent repeat of his preliminary time.
Up in the stands, we continued to watch some of the exciting races, waiting for Jessica to start her preliminary round throwing. We headed down to watch her at the far end of the stadium about 15 minutes before the scheduled start. We were very unhappy to get down to the throwing area only to find they started the competition 20 minutes early. Even unhappier, throws coach Kerri Bilben drove all the way down to UMD after teaching band class, only to arrive at the same exact time as we did, after Jessica was done. Oh well, she threw about equal to her season average, 28’ 3” to finish 12th. And we let the meet organizers know what we thought about the unannounced schedule change!
After baking a couple more hours in the sun, watching some great racing, we finally set up the blocks at the far end of the stadium for the half lap, 200 meter race. Molly got a good start in lane 3, but couldn’t quite fire up to top speed around the corner. She finished strong as usual, but finished 4th in 26.98, her best time of the season but 2/10s of a second too slow to return to state. She had a great senior season, earning all conference honors twice, establishing herself as one of the top sprinters in the area, and earning a scholarship at Winona State for next year.
Peter knew he faced a mighty challenge in the 200, as the No. 8 seed. Standing on his blocks at the start, then watching from the far corner, it looked like he was way behind the field, just having a bad run. We were surprised when he came back to get his warmups with a smile on his face. He had ended up 7th, but ran a career best of 23.88, by far his best time of the season. He’s already planning his summer football/ track training program.
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