Belpre hosts first home track meet in 10 years

Belpre’s Aedan Mullins, left, runs in the 4×800 relay during a quad meet Thursday.
(Photo by Aaron Lee)

BELPRE — Thanks to renovations to the track at Ralph Holder Stadium at Belpre High School, the Golden Eagles were able to host their first home track meet in 10 years on Thursday. In a quad between Warren, Nelsonville-York, Frontier and Belpre, Belpre’s boys and Warren’s girls were victorious.

“It was fantastic. It was really exciting. We had tons of support, lots of people came out. Our kids ran really well. I think it was great for the community,” said Belpre girls track head coach Katie Pintz.

Given the size of the meet, events were quickly run one after the other, shortening the amount of down time for athletes and providing, “…a very good workout for the kids. We had lots of kids in three or four events, only having five or so minutes in between their events sometimes because it went so fast. I was very impressed with the times they still ran without having much time in between.”

On the girls side, Warren finished with 48 points, seven ahead of second place Belpre. Frontier finished in third with 23 and Nelsonville-York had 17. Belpre’s boys finished with a meet-high 56 points, with Warren coming in second with 48.5. Nelsonville-York had 31.5 and Frontier finished with 13.

Frontier’s Tysie Hoff had quite the meet, finishing first in the 100 meter dash (13.2), 200 meter dash (28.1) and long jump (14-2.75). The Cougars had one first place finish on the boys side, coming by way of Preston Stamp in the long jump with a leap of 18-11.

Warren’s Emma Stemple clears a hurdle in in the 300 hurdles during a quad meet Thursday in Belpre.
(Photo by Aaron Lee)

The Golden Eagles had three individual gold finishes in the girls meet. Julia Way completed the 400 meter dash in 1:05.3, besting all the competition. In the 1600, Shy Miller finished in 5:57.7, good enough for first. Continuing the trend of long distance success, Lila Dugan won the two mile in 14:28.9.

Belpre’s girls won both the 4×200 and 4×800 relays. In the former, the team of Chloe Brumbaugh, Samarra Wolfe, Kayleigh Sheldon and Kacy Hahn combined forces to win in 2:13.5. Way, Dugan, Wolfe and Miller won the latter with a time of 8:43.8.

For Belpre’s boys, several athletes finished at the top of their events. Aedan Mullins won both the 400 meter (54.8) and the 800 meter (2:12.7) for the Golden Eagles. Drew Rickman earned a first place finish by completing the 200 meter dash in 25.3 seconds. Belpre won both the mile and the two mile, with Johnny Miller beating the competition in the mile with a time of 4:56.5 and Blake Rodgers finishing the two mile with a blistering time of 9:37.9. The Golden Eagles’ lone field event win came via Matthew Rasmussen, who had the furthest discus throw of the day at 118-10.

The Golden Eagles won both the 4×400 (3:53.4) and 4×800 (8:43.8). Chase Maze, Austin Jenkins and Aedan Mullins participated in both, with Miller solely competing in the 4×400 and Rodgers the 800.

Emma Stemple won both hurdles events for Warren, winning the 100 in 20 seconds flat and the 300 in 56.2. In the 800 meters, Rania Singh finished in 2:51, good enough for first. Elayna Greenwalt earned first place in the high jump by clearing 4-4. Pole vaulter Sarah Pettey won with a height of 7-0. The relay team of Greenwalt, Cassidy McCarthy, Emma Stemple and Allison Stemple won both the 4×100 (56.8) and 4×400 (4:46) for the Warriors.

Frontier’s Tysie Hoff runs in the 100 meter dash during a quad meet Thursday in Belpre.
(Photo by Aaron Lee)

Warren’s boys had four first place finishes. Two of them came from Mason Werry, who won both the 300 hurdles (43.8) and the high jump (5’6). Two Warriors tied at the top of the pole vault results. Jaxon Venham and Jackson Fairbanks both cleared 9’6 to earn Warren a collective eight points. Fairbanks, Tre Fox, Kaden Sargent and Nate Hall earned first in the 4×100 relay (49.6).

While the Golden Eagles did hit some bumps along the way while hosting their first home meet in a decade, Pintz was impressed with the result and was thankful for the community support, “It went better than expected. There are a few things to fix before the next meet on Monday, but overall I think it went really well. We had tons of volunteers, which helped a lot.”

The meet on Monday will be for middle school athletes. On the 26th, Belpre will host an invitational with around 10 teams. It will be named after the late Belpre alumnus Robert “Bob” Holdren, pole vault standout at Ohio State that never lost an indoor or outdoor track meet while competing for the Buckeyes.

Contact Aaron Lee at alee@newsandsentinel.com