Abby track captures second, sixth at Colby

The Abbotsford track and field team made the short trip south to Colby for their second outdoor meet of the season on Tuesday afternoon. In a slightly unorthodox competition featuring no field events due to recent weather conditions, the Falcons competed in only their events on the track.

The girls took second place out of eight teams present at the meet. Their 75 team points were second only to Colby’s 108. Meanwhile the boys team closed the day in sixth place, earning 31 points over the course of the competition.

Azul Diaz put forward several top performances for the Falcons on Tuesday. The sophomore long distance runner took first place in the 3200-meter run, posting a personal best time of 13:35.42 to win the event. She also took second in the 1600-meter run with a time of 6:26.32. Teammate Iris Cruz also scored for Abbotsford in the 1600-meter run, placing fifth with a time of 6:25.83.

Cruz and Reese Molitor provided more top-five finishes for the Falcons in their long distance events by taking third and fourth respectively in the 800-meter run. The pair posted times of 3:01.25 and 3:07.57 in the event.

Sydney Falteisek claimed Abbotsford’s other event win, taking a closely contested 100-meter dash. The Falcons finished with three of the top four spots, with only Colby’s Jazmyn Heeg breaking up Falteisek and third place Chloe Cihlar and fourth place Sommer Brodhagen. Mere hundreths of a second separated the top three runners, with Falteisek posting a time of 13.61 seconds and Cihlar having a final time of 13.67 seconds. Brodhagen was not far behind, putting up a time of 13.75 seconds.

Cihlar also had another top five finish in the 200-meter dash, where she placed fifth with a time of 29.64 seconds. Falteisek added a fifth place finish of her own in the 300-meter hurdles. She completed the event in 55.97 seconds.

The Falcons sprint 4x100-meter relay consisting of Hazel Flink, Sophie Kulesa, Calley Ruesch and Tamika Heck took fifth place with a time of 59.66 seconds and the 4x200-meter relay of Brodhagen, Falteisek, Cihlar and Celia Schindler placed fourth with a time of 1:58.91.

The boys 4x200-meter relay team of Irvin Aguilera, Emilio Escalera, Chase Boller and Christian Fuentes had one of their best finishes of the meet. The team took second in the event, putting up a time of 1:43.66. The 4x100-meter relay of Escalera, Fuentes, Fernando Perez and Irvin Davila also scored for Abbotsford after taking fifth in the event with a time of 52.85 seconds.

AJ Brodhagen also added a second place finish for the boys team, continuing his success in the 400-meter dash. The sophomore posted a PR time of 56.59 seconds in the event.

Jack Schindler had two top-five performances on Tuesday, taking fourth in the 1600-meter run with a time of 5:18.58 and fifth in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:26.21.

Also scoring for the Falcons were Jack Sheahan in the 1600-meter run, where he placed eighth with a time of 6:08.27 and Boller in the 300-meter hurdles, where he also took eighth with a time of 50.69 seconds.