Northern Region Meet Summary

FAIRFAX, VA -- The Lake Braddock girls and Hayfield boys, both winners in the always tough Patriot District two weeks earlier, prevailed again as winners at the 2005 Northern Region Indoor Track and Field Championships held at the George Mason University Fieldhouse on Saturday, February 26.

The Bruins girls piled up 49 of their 86 winning points in the field events in holding off Patriot District and Northern Region runnerup Hayfield (71 points) and Concorde District champ Centreville\'s 70 point third place total in scoring through eight places on a 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 basis.

Lake Braddock was led in the field events by senior Ashley Haislip. The University of North Carolina bound Haislip was the only athlete able to establish a new meet record as she set a personal best of 5 feet, 9 inches in the high jump.

Haislip\'s 5-9 effort broke the meet mark of 5-8.5 set by Jefferson\'s Krystle Moss in 2000, who incidentally won the Southeastern Conference Championship in the high jump this past weekend at 5-11.25 representing the University of Florida.

Haislip also racked up a third place finish in the pole vault at 9-9 and finished sixth in the long jump (16-10) in scoring 19 points towards the Bruins cause.

Lake Braddock also got a field event victory from junior Teressa McCoy as she improved on her personal best in the shot put by almost a foot a half with her winning mark of 40-3.75. The Bruins were also greatly aided in the field events by junior Anna Noguchi with her runnerup finish in the pole vault (9-9) and fourth place in the triple jump (35-11.25).

On the track Lake Braddock was led by Kelsey Snowden. The Bruins senior placed second in the 1,600 run at 5 minutes, 11.17 seconds and then came back 45 minutes later to make a strong move in the last 300 meters to capture the 1,000 run in 3:00.47 while junior Erin Klein chipped in with a fourth place in the 1,600 run (5:11.48) and third place in the 3,200 run (11:21.15).

Team runnerup Hayfield received a very impressive distance double from senior Melissa Dewey. First, the Foot Locker Cross Country All American led from start to finish to easily capture the 1,600 run in 5:00.69. Dewey followed that victory up an hour and a half later with an impressive performance in the 3,200 run.

In lapping the entire field, Dewey basically put together almost two state qualifying 1,600 efforts as she posted a 5:17 mark halfway through the race and then came back with the same time in the second half of the race to set a personal indoor best of 10:34.62.

Hayfield also posted a win from senior Murielle Ahoure as she successfully defended her title in the 55 dash at 7.18. Hawks sophomore Marika Gray finished second to Ahoure in the 55 dash at 7.37 and was also third in the 300 dash (41.93) and Ahoure and Gray teamed with junior Nakeisha Wineglass, who was third in the triple jump (36-6.5) and junior Asia Odum who was fourth in the 55 hurdles (8.76) to win the 4x200 relay at 1:44.88.

A young Centreville squad had freshman Brittini Finch as their top point producer. Finch was a double winner in the field events as she first notched a victory in the long jump with a personal best of 17-10.75 and then came back in the triple jump to go from third to first on her final attempt with her winning leap of 36-11.5.

Finch also ran a leg on the Wildcats second place 4x200 relay (1:45.61) and fourth place 4x400 relay (4:08.33) as well as placing third in the 55 dash (7.48).

Centreville also posted a victory in the 300 dash with freshman Jordan Grant (41.61) and a second place in the 500 run with sophomore Cate Tisinger (1:17.67).

Fourth place Westfield (51points) shaved thirteen seconds off their seasonal best with a win in the 4x800 relay at 9:32.26 with the team of Jessie Deegan, Brittany Sevacho, Tasia Potasinski and Laura Pramstaller and fifth place Oakton (41 points) was led by senior Danielle Light, who won the 500 dash in 1:17.16 and anchored the Cougars 4x400 quartet which also included Amber Young, Allegra Smith and Meredith Tighe to victory in 4:01.78.

Jefferson and Chantilly tied for sixth with 35 points and had the other two winners with Jefferson senior Mari Yamaguchi, soaring to a personal best of 10-6 to win the pole vault and Chantilly senior Jasmine Nelson also established a personal best in winning the 55 hurdles at 8.61.

The Hayfield boys, like the Lake Braddock girls, also had a 15 point margin of victory in scoring 76 points as the Patriot District swept the top four spots with West Potomac a surprising but solid second with 61 points, followed by Robinson in third place with 47 points and Lake Braddock finishing fourth with 44 points.

Hayfield was led by long sprinting standout Chris Richardson\'s two individual wins. The Hawks junior was never challenged in the 500 dash in winning that event for the second year in a row, this time at an impressive 1:05.29.

Richardson then came back to win the 300 dash in 35.62, an event that sealed the meet for the Hawks as Richardson\'s senior teammates Travis Swaggard finished second in 36.03 and James Simmons sixth (37.09) to give Hayfield 21 points in the event.

Swaggard also anchored the 4x200 relay squad which included Simmons, senior Dustin Barnett and sophomore Mauricio Molina to a victory in 1:33.07 and chipped in with a fifth place in the 55 dash (6.70).

Hayfield also received a good day from Jeff Miller. The Hawks sophomore defeated a stellar field in the 1,000 run, which included eight runners who already had auotmatic state qualifiers, as he gradually pulled away on the last lap to win in 2:33.65. Miller also played a large role in relay duty in helping Hayfield to third place in the 4x4 (3:29.04) and sixth in the 4x8 (8:29.55).

West Potomac\'s runnerup total of 61 points was achieved by just four point scorers, led by junior Antwane Minter and senior Charles Jones, with that duo playing a part in 55 of the points for the Wolverines. Individually, Minter won the triple jump (44-6.75) and was second in both the long jump (22-2) and 55 dash (6.61) while Charles Jones set a personal best by more than a foot and a half to win the long jump (22-3) as well as claiming victory in the 55 hurdles in a personal best time of 7.73 and snaring eighth in the triple jump (41-8.75).

Minter and Charles Jones also teamed with Charles\'s twin brother Chris Jones and junior Houston Murphy to grab a surprising second place in the 4x200 even though they ran in the slowest of the four sections on Saturday with Chris Jones also adding a third place in the 55 hurdles (8.00) to complete the scoring for the Wolverines.

Third place Robinson posted two victories with senior Tyler Tucker claiming the pole vault crown at 13-0 and the 4x400 relay team of Dwayne Handon, Mark Hussa, Christian Withcher and junior Tommy Barrineau, on a determined anchor leg, set a new school indoor record with their winning time of 3:28.62.

The Rams also ran well in the other two relays with a third place in the 4x8 (8:07.87) anchored by Hussa, who was also fourth in the 1,000 run (2:34.79), and a third place in the 4x2 (1:34.61) on a team which included Handon, who also grabbed fifth in the triple jump (41-11.25).

For fourth place Lake Braddock, all but five of their 44 points were in the field events with senior David Jones accounting for almost half of the field points for the Bruins. Jones won the high jump (6-5) on his last attempt over McLean\'s Doug Zimmer (6-4) in a nice infield duel and also finished fourth in the shot put (45-11.5) and sixth in the long jump (21-0).

Lake Braddock also received a pair of third places from senior Jon Cowden in the shot put (50-2.75) and junior Kofi Asamoah in the triple jump (43-11.75) as well as a fourth in the pole vault from sophomore Ian Prohaska (12-6).

Chantilly was the highest scoring non-Patriot District school with 42 points to post their highest region finish in recent memory at fifth place. The Chargers posted one victory with junior Brad Siragusa winning the 1,600 run in 4:24.43 and Chantilly also got a big boost from senior Jimmy Beyeah, who was second in the 55 hurdles in a personal best time of 7.96; came back ten minutes later to place third in the 55 dash (6.66) and was also fourth in the long jump (21-7).

Langley came away from regionals with two wins as senior John Wingfield successfully defended his 55 dash title in a seasonal best time of 6.56 and the Saxons 4x800 relay team of Chris Frames, Jeff Morse, Jack Pembroke and anchor Steve Frames won an exciting as usual 4x8 with Steve Frames battling West Springfield anchor Kris Benton for the entire final leg with Langley prevailing in a very good time of 8:05.41.

The other regional champions were Annandale senior Julio Villatoro, who won the shot put for the second straight year (53-6.5) and Kyle Smith of Jefferson in the 3,200 run.

Smith came into the meet as the ninth seed and was running anywhere from fifth through seventh place until the final 800 meters. The Colonials senior gradually moved up to the front running quartet and then traded the lead back and forth over the last two laps with top seed Dawit Legesse of Lee, before finally taking over the lead for good with just over 100 meters to go and winning in a personal best of 9:31.06 with Legesse second in 9:32.43.