Sullivan has big finish; Richter and Machon get 6th and 7th
Joe Sullivan couldn’t have left Medford’s athletic program on a much higher note, while sophomores Meredith Richter and Jaylin Machon showed glimpses of what they are capable of doing in the future during a successful weekend for the Raiders at the WIAA Division 2 state track and field championships at UW-La Crosse.
After winning sectional championships at Rice Lake in the boys 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs, Sullivan stated his case to be known as the top distance runner to come through Medford with thirdand fourth-place finishes in those races and doing so in school-record times that smashed the old marks.
Sullivan leaves Medford with three WIAA medals in track and field, another in cross country, numerous conference, regional and sectional awards as well as a solid basketball career. He plans to compete at the next level in cross country and track at UW-La Crosse.
“It’s huge,” he said of earning medals in both events. “It was definitely a big goal. I wanted to get the school records. I beat those both in the mile and two-mile. To get two medals is awesome. I knew I had a good chance at the two. I just had to run good and I was going to get it. That was awesome.”
Richter ran free and easy in the “slow” heat of the girls 800-meter run on Saturday afternoon and blew away the rest of the group. She got a pleasant surprise after heat two when her personal-best time of 2:20.51 stood as the sixth-best out of 16 runners and put her on the last spot on
MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS the awards podium.
“That was five seconds off my time at sectionals,” said Richter, who inched closer to the 2019 school record of 2:18.15 set by Katie Phillips. “It was just weird, I felt like I was by myself almost. I finished and I was waiting to see how the second heat finished. When I saw they went from the girl in fifth place (on the results board) and then they skipped and went to seventh, I was like, ‘wait a second.’ I was just so surprised.”
Machon made her state debut in the pole vault competition and put herself in medal contention by hitting 9 feet and 9-6 on her first attempts. She topped out at 10 feet and finished seventh, one spot better than her pre-meet seed and one spot away from earning a medal.
“It was pretty exciting,” said Machon, who was added to the state field as an extra qualifier after hitting 10 feet at the sectional. “I didn’t know I was going to come because I didn’t qualify at sectionals. When (vault coach) Katie (Losiewicz) called me I was pretty excited. It’s the first time qualifying by myself and not with the relay team. It’s pretty cool.”
How they did it
The state field in both boys distance races was stacked with talent, but as he’s done through most of his running career, Sullivan embraced the challenges.
He entered the 1,600-meter run as the third seed, but found himself in sixth at the 400-meter mark at 1:03.09. He was seventh at the halfway point at a 2:08.74 clip, but he said he knew he was still in a solid position. He showed it with a third lap that shot him up to fourth. His final lap was his fastest at 1:02.14 and got him one spot closer to champion Shane Griepentrog of Valders (4:11.82) and Logan Measner of Kettle Moraine Lutheran (4:12.29).
Sullivan’s third-place time of 4:16.62 shattered the longest standing running record on Medford’s board, the 1984 time of 4:22.2 set by Dale Niggeman. Sullivan finished fifth at state last year at 4:24.27.
“That felt pretty good, I’m not gonna lie,” Sullivan said. “We all went out fast. I knew Shane was going to go out fast, because I know he can usually run the time that he did. I was thinking they’d go out like 1:01, 1:02, but it was 60-flat or just under that. I came in at 1:03. A 1:04 was my goal for the first lap. But it was a 1:03 and I was still behind some people in the pack. I thought, ‘I’m feeling good, so this is decent.’ I came around the 800 at 2:08 or 2:07. I was like, ‘all right, I know I can keep this up for my third lap and in my last lap I know I can let ‘er kick and get it. I can hold on in this third lap and I’ll be in good position for the last lap. I know I’ve got a kick’ and I was able to kick at the end there.”
That kick got him past Drew Stephens from the University School of Milwaukee (4:16.99), Clay Taylor of Valders (4:18.18) and Eli Boppart of Mauston (4:18.2) who all medaled as well. Sullivan’s seasonlong running mates, Sam Gremban of Northland Pines (4:29.25) and Owen Clark of Lakeland (4:30.9) were 14th and 15th.
“I knew I was going to have something (at the end),” he said. “I know I have a pretty decent kick. I could feel myself catch (Stephens) a little at the 200. I could feel myself reeling him in. Once I felt that, I caught him by just that little bit then I knew I could get him.”
The fourth-place finish in the 3,200-meter run on Saturday was, in some ways, even more impressive.
Entering as the seventh seed, Sullivan seemed stuck between seventh and ninth place most of the way. In fact, he was still in eighth place after seven laps. But the eighth lap was special. He was clocked at 1:01.57 in the last 400 meters and moved up four spots. Only Griepentrog, who won in 9:04.98, had a faster last lap at 1:01.28.
“There were some guys making a move at the 400,” he said. “I’m thinking if I can stick with them here, maybe I’ll have something at the end. I was able to hang on their tails, just stay in that group and was able to kick around at that last 100 and slingshot them. That was awesome. That was really fun.”
Griepentrog’s state-title double was accomplished with a 0.34-second margin over Stephens, while Measner was third in 9:09.43. Thomas Stephens, also from University School, was fifth, 0.18 seconds behind Sullivan, while Boppart, who Sullivan has raced against a lot in the 2021-22 school year, got another sixth-place medal at 9:25.29.
Sullivan blew away Medford’s school record of 9:37, set by Evan Lewandowski in 2010. He improved on his ninth-place finish of a year ago, which was accomplished with a time of 9:56.72.
“I haven’t ran too many hard twomiles or have been in a great field like this to run against. That was awesome,” Sullivan said. “Just before, I thought, ‘well it’s the last race of my high school career, so might as well let it go,’ and I did. I knew if I ran my race, played out my strategy, I was going to be able to get a good run there at the end.”
Certainly appearing comfortable on the UW-L track, there’s certainly reason to believe Sullivan will only get better.
“It’s a cool moment being here, running good in this last race,” he said. “It hasn’t really hit me yet about all my high school accolades or anything, but it’s a cool moment. I’m glad to be here.”
Richter certainly was glad to be where she was on Saturday afternoon. Being seeded 12th in the girls 800-meter race put her in the second position out of six runners in heat one. So, she set her initial plan on working off Maya Pearcy of Columbus, who held the first position. Instead, Richter got out in front quickly and never had to worry about anyone else. She led Dodgeville-Mineral Point’s Annie Robinson by 1.13 seconds at the halfway point with her time of 1:06.79 and widened the gap in lap two, beating Robinson by 4.84 seconds. Winneconne’s Sophie Yetter was third in the heat at 2:25.64.
Richter’s friendly rival, Nora Gremban of Northland Pines, won the final comfortably in 2:12.4 over Shorewood’s Isabella Lozier (2:13.67) and Little Chute’s Jessica Wilson (2:17.71). When the results board showed Osceola’s Rachel Ulrich in fourth at 2:19.39 and Shorewood’s Annika Elliott in fifth at 2:19.83, suddenly Richter knew she had a shot at a medal.
“With my ranking, the coaches kept saying, ‘you have a chance, you have a chance,’” Richter said. “I wasn’t thinking I would perform like that. The girl ranked ahead of me, I didn’t know how she would run. I thought maybe I would have to be right with her. I didn’t think I’d be ahead of her the whole time.
“I felt really good,” she added. “In my first lap, my split was like five seconds faster than what coach wanted me at and I didn’t even feel a difference. I was like, this feels normal, just keep going. Yesterday I didn’t have the best day. So this made up for it.”
Her race on Friday was the 400-meter dash preliminary, where she finished in 1:01.13, which was only 0.4 seconds off her best time of the spring at the Tomahawk regional, but the 14th-place finish obviously wasn’t what she was looking for. A time of 1:00.59 from Campbellsport’s Santana Ryan got the 10th and last spot in Saturday’s final.
“I have a lot more confidence in myself,” said Richter, who ran at state last year as part of Medford’s sixth-place 3,200-meter relay team. “I didn’t think I would be able to do this is in an individual event today. Then when yesterday kind of set me back, I thought, ‘I don’t know what I’m doing here.’ Then today, it’s like, ‘I got it back again.’ This makes me excited for next year. I want to do better, put more training in. I know what I need to work on now.”
Machon also is thinking bigger in the future after showing she belonged in the pole vault competition. In a field of 18 girls, she was one of six to clear the first two heights without a miss, not including the two girls who passed on those heights. When the bar went to 10 feet, Machon was one of 13 girls left.
“It’s always good in case there is a tie, then you have less misses,” she said of her good start. “So that’s good and then it was a little confidence builder too.”
Five of the girls went out at 10 feet with three straight misses. Machon was close to being the sixth after not coming close on her first two attempts. But the third one was perfect and she earned her shot at 10-6.
“I didn’t think I was going to make it,” Machon said. “I don’t know really (what worked on the third). I just tried harder I guess.”
She didn’t hit 10-6, but she’s confident she will, which would break the school record she shares with 2015 graduate Margaret Hamann.
“I think I’ll get it next year,” she said. Anna Schueller of Green Bay Notre Dame and Grace Werch of Berlin both hit 11-3, but Schueller won the championship with fewer misses along the way. Ella Spilker of Greendale Martin Luther was third at 11 feet.
Meredith Richter enjoys her spotlight moment on the podium as the sixth-place finisher in Saturday’s WIAA Division 2 girls 800-meter championship run.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS
