Porter Granger (Photo via New Rockford Transcript)
Athletes from around the Lake Region took home numerous accolades at the Class B state track and field meet this past weekend, held at the MDU Resources Community Bowl in Bismarck.
There were three individual state champions from the area: New Rockford-Sheyenne’s Porter Granger (long jump), Benson County’s Carter Engebretson (shot put) and Nelson County’s Dagan Slade (shot put).
Granger won the long jump out of 31 placers. He recorded a jump of 22’4.5’’ — which wasn’t even his personal or season best. He set his personal record earlier this year with a 22’7’’ jump.
Granger also placed third and set personal records in the 100-meter and 200-meter finals. The senior is headed to run track at Valley City State University next year.
Engebretson, who dominated the boys’ shot put all season long, won the event with a personal record of 55’8’’. Slade won the girls’ shot put with a distance of 43’4’’. It was the same distance as Hatton/Northwood’s Elizabeth Pinke, but Slade won by fractions of an inch. It was slightly short of her personal record of 43’6’’.
The best-performing teams from the area were the NR-S boys (10th out of 45 placing teams) and the Langdon Area/Munich girls (19th out of 46 placing teams).
LA/M’s Meredith Romfo, a North Dakota State commit for javelin, placed second after winning the javelin toss last year. She recorded a throw of 127’6’’ — the second-best of her career, behind only her state-winning mark of 136’5’’ last year.
Aubrey Badding (fifth in triple jump), Mya Swanson (ninth in 800-meter) and Fenja Lawson (ninth in shot put) all helped the Cardinals’ case as well. Their 4×800 relay squad of Hallie Overby, Badding, Olivia Lorenz and Swanson added a seventh-place finish with a time of 10:00.00 on the dot.
Cody Amble led the LA/M boys. He placed fifth in the 200-meter finals with a personal record of 22.49, along with a ninth-place finish in the triple jump.
The NR-S boys’ 4×100 relay team came away with a fourth-place finish. In prelims, the quartet of Koy Zieman, Easton Benz, Thomas Allmaras and Granger came in ninth and posted a time of 45.06 — precisely one second faster than their previous season record of 45.07.
They went on to run the relay in 44.11 seconds in the finals to grab fourth place.
On the girls’ side for the Rockets, sophomore Emmie Belquist placed ninth in the 100-meter hurdle finals (23.03) after coming in first out of 22 contestants in the prelims with a personal record of 15.50.
Belquist went on to place fifth in both the 300-meter hurdle prelims and finals, setting personal records both times (46.14 to 46.11).
The Benson County girls, who placed 22nd out of 46 teams as a group, got a pair of fourth-place finishes. Haley Scevers set a personal record of 120’10’’ in the javelin toss, good for fourth out of 20 contestants. The 4×800 relay team of Aubrey Kenner, Kaitlyn Maddock, Kami Arnston and Evyn Jacobson posted a time of 9:56.68 to come in fourth out of 23 groups.
For Nelson County, to complement Slade’s shot put heroics, Tyler Cree-Beglau placed sixth in the boys’ triple jump. He recorded a distance of 42’6.5’’. His personal record is 43’8’’, set earlier this year.
North Star’s Brody Parker placed seventh in the 400-meter finals (51.09) after coming in fifth out of 28 runners in the prelims (51.33). For the Bearcats’ girls , Claire Jorde placed sixth out of 20 contestants in the high jump with a personal record of 5’0’’.
