Three area athletes reached the podium as the WIAA track and field championships began Friday in La Crosse.
Menominee Indian High School sophomore Ania Smith took fifth in the Division 3 shot put, going 39 feet, 11 inches on her final throw of the day. The toss moved her from eighth place onto the podium.
“It was a pretty good performance,” Menominee Indian coach Chris Clache said. “We had a delay that kind of threw everybody off a little bit, but she pulled it out at the end. It was a pretty impressive throw.”
Rain delayed the meet, held at Veterans Memorial Stadium in La Crosse, for about an hour and a half.
Marion junior Cassidy Detert moved up to third with her final throw of 40-1 1/2. Algoma’s Kennedy Blahnik won the event with a toss of 48-8.
Gresham/Bowler junior Drew Payne took fifth in the Division 3 triple jump, going 42-2 3/4 on his second jump of the day.
“It felt amazing,” Payne said. “My first one was all right, my second one was my longest one.”
Payne said he felt like the meet was dragging on after the delay as he waited for his chance to jump.
The jump was a personal record for Payne, which was his goal heading into the meet.
“That’s all I wanted,” he said.
Spring Valley’s Zac Webster won the event, jumping 44-8 1/2.
Menominee Indian junior Gordon James III had the seventh-fastest time, 11.53, in the 100 dash preliminaries. He will compete in the finals Saturday. He missed the cut in the 200 dash.
Gresham/Bowler senior Austin Olsen took 10th in the 300 hurdles preliminaries, qualifying for Saturday’s finals in that event. His time was 41.94.
Division 2
Wittenberg-Birnamwood senior Aaron Monnot jumped 42-7 3/4 in the triple jump, taking 10th place. University School of Milwaukee’s Djdade Denson won the event with a 46-7 3/4 jump.
The Chargers’ 4x800 relay team of Alexis Balliett, Mikayla King, Taylor Nier and Erica White Eagle took 15th with a time of 10:38.25.
The 4x400 relay team of King, White Eagle, Maykayla Verkuilen and Denica Wendler took 16th with a time of 4:16.86.
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