Complete results are now posted from the VHSL Group A State Championships held Saturday at the Radford University. Photos also to be posted soon.
- VHSL Group A State Championships - Complete Results
- VHSL Group A State Championships Photo Gallery by Scott Rigler - More photos to be added.
- Upload Your Videos From The VHSL Group A State Championships
Photo by Scott Rigler
The Lebanon boys and Clarke County girls were crowned as 2008 Group A team champions. Out of Region D, the Lebanon boys had two individual athletes really excel for them in state competition in the distance runner Jakob Maidens and sprinter Skyler Musick. Maidens took second in a close 1600 meter race with Ben Veilleux (4:27.31) at 4:27.45 and later came back to win the 800 meter state title with a time of 2:00.35. Musick had to settle for second behind Radford's Jon Thompson in both 100 and 200 meter dash races, but his 16 points were very critical in helping Lebanon reach their final point total of 66 points. Maidens and Musick finished the meet on Lebanon's 4x400 meter relay, which placed second in 3:33.59 and helpd further distance themselves from the second place squad Radford (49 pts).
While the Clarke County boys were unable to win a third straight outdoor track title, the Clarke County girls kept the streak of at least some first place hardware coming back to Berryville as they ended up 25 points ahead of Bull Run District and Region B rival George Mason (49 pts) with a final team score of 74 1/2 points. Clarke County had many top six finishers throughout the meet to help add to their team score as they only had one individual champion with Sophia Holmes taking the 800 meter title in 2:23.03. Holmes also ran on the victorious 4x400 meter relay team, which ran a solid time for a Group A school in 4:09.39 to win the event comfortably by four seconds.
The performances of the meet though belonged to Lancaster's Andrea White in the field events and Glenvar's Megan Marsico in the distance races. White won state titles in all three jumping events including a state meet record clearance of 5'7.75". Her winning marks in the long jump and triple jump were solid as well at 17'7" and 35'4" respectively. White also placed fifth in the 100 meter dash and fourth in the 200 meter dash to score 43 points by herself and allow Lancaster to finish third as a team in the points standings albeit with only one individual scoring.
Photo by Scott Rigler
White was not the only athlete setting meet records as Glenvar sophomore Megan Marsico became only the third girl in Virginia this outdoor season to break five minutes in the 1600 meter run as she just snuck under the time barrier with 4:59.97 state meet record performance. Marsico dominated the race as she won by over 20 seconds and was just as dominant later on in the 3200 meter run with a 39 second victory in a near sub 11 minute performance at 11:00.76.
Photo by Scott Rigler
A star was born on Saturday in Manassas Park freshmen Shareese Roberts as she simply ran away from the competition in Group A as she completed the triple crown in the sprinting events by crossing the line first in the 100 (12.28), 400 (57.57), and 200 (25.84) meter dashes. Her times would be competitive at the Group AA and Group AAA levels, yet she is still only a ninth grader with three years to go to see if she can haul in a total of 12 championships.
Covington's Emanuel Alfred was the king of the throwing events this Saturday as the returning shot put state champion not only won a straight consecutive state title in the shot with a mark at 52'9", but also made it sweep of victories as he threw for a mark of 166'7" in the discus to better his nearest competitor by ten feet.
More to come from the VHSL Group A State Championships...