The third and final club meet of the Indiana Tech High Performance Series is set to take place this weekend in Fort Wayne. There looks to be good entries on both the boys and girls side including the season debut of Nicki Southerland as she is entered in the 800m/1600m. MileSplit will have results, race videos, and updates throughout the day with all of the action. Check out some of the things we could see for the girls below.
Girls Sprints
In the 60m dash there are three entries with seed times under 8 seconds with Savannah Lake (7.71), Madi Jenkins (7.74), and Analena Peterson (7.95). Savannah, owning the top seed, is coming of a win last weekend in the 60m finals at the Indiana Runner Sprint Showcase where she ran to a new PR of 7.71.
The 200m will feature a very similar group of runners towards the front with the same top three entrants from the 60m also entered in the 200m. Lake would place fifth last weekend in a double that was almost immediately after the 60m last week. The top three entries all have seed times under 26 seconds.
Girls Mid-Distance
In the 400m there looks to be a group of girls that could cause some noise on the leaderboards with four entered at sub 60 seconds. Off this group Ava Grace Winters has the top mark so far this year as she ran a 58.14 earlier this month in Louisville. Addison Smith, Kate Kubacki, and Makena Cruse are all also seeded at 59 seconds.
In the 800m Nicki Southerland looks to make her season debut after having another tremendous cross country season. Last track season in outdoor season Nicki would become the state champion in the 1600m with a 4:43 before becoming state runner-up in the 800m later that day. Currently the 800m state lead still sits with Brinkely Cooper at 2:16.82 but could after this weekend we should expect it to go down.
Girls Distance
Southerland will also race in the 1600m in a race that may end being a solo effort depending on how her chooses to race it. She is entered with a 4:55 with the next closest time belonging to Emerson Skatell. If Nicki chooses to race for time, we could see her try to challenge the state lead for the 1600m which currently sits with Ava Jarrell's converted 1600m from last weekend where she ran 4:55.39 (4:53.68).
In the 3200m Maddie Graber appears to be the only entry with a sub 12 minute seed time with a 11:37. Maddie would run a 5:27 full mile this past weekend at the Indiana Runner Distance Showcase, one week after running a 12:03 2 mile in Louisville for Eastern Indoors.
Girls Field Events
In the high jump there looks to be three girls that could separate themselves from the rest of the field. Alyssa Christian (5' 6"), Isabella Slone (5' 5"), and Amanda Rauch (5' 4") all have seeds that separate themselves from the rest of the field.
Ashlyn Schwab has picked up right where she left off last season as she has already vaulted to a 12 foot mark in Ohio back in early January. Delaney Teachnor looks to have another solid seed mark in the field as she has a better PR by 3 inches (12' 6" at Regionals). Teachnor would also finish her IHSAA season on the podium with a 4th place finish at state.
In a field of 19 long jumpers Kate Kubacki has one of the best seeds heading into the weekend. A few weeks ago she would place third at the Indiana Runner Invitational with a leap of 16' 5". Piper Pierce is not too far behind as she has jumped 15' 10" in her last outing at Indiana Tech.
In the shot put Taylor Verdell looks to have one of the few seed marks in the field with her listed at 7m (about 23 feet). It would take a throw of 28 feet to crack the top 25 for the state so far this season.