After a succesful 2013 season, this season the Track & Field team will have to ‘jump over the hurdles’ of training new members, and filling the spots of those who graduated to make it to the finish line on top of the podium.

“In past seasons both teams were able to mass many points from the field events in the shot put, discus, and pole vault. The main performers have graduated,” said Coach Eric Benjamin. “This year we will be rebuilding in those areas.”

Last season 17 athletes qualified for the State Championship, both the Boys and Girls teams won the Susquehanna Division Championship, and the Boys team placed a close second out of 15 schools at the UCBAC conference championship. The bar is set high for the upcoming season, but Benjamin notes that he tries not to have any specific goals at the beginning of the season for the team.

“The overall collective goal is for each athlete on the team to compete at and and up to the best of their physical abilities,” said Benjamin. “The biggest competition will be the athletes being able to push themselves to be the best.”

“I hope to improve my times and have a good senior year,” said senior Paige Rickey.

The captains of the team have yet to be selected, but this year the selection process is different because prospective candidates will have to fill out an application to apply.

“This [the application] and overall practice behaviors will determine who is selected,” said Benjamin.

The team’s first meet of the year is the Knights and Lions Invitational at Century High School on March 22. Benjamin hopes that this event will help the team get into the mindset of competing.

Changes have been made to the size of the team this season, as there are have many cuts made unlike previous years. The athletes were tested in the 60-meter dash, a mile run, and a horizontal and vertical jump test. Then the athletes selected what area they wanted to be competing in and were tested specifically based on that area.

“If an athlete scored toward the lower half of each test consistently as compared to others on the team or had been on the team in prior years and showed no improvement in performance they were cut,” said Benjamin.

Benjamin also notes that fewer team member will allow the coaches to give more attention to detail in the process of training, specifically for field events, to contribute to the success of the athlete.
“This year our team made cuts so there’s a lot less people, but there is a lot of new talent coming into the team,” said Rickey.