KENT CITY — Walking off the track after the only race she didn’t win Saturday, Olivet senior Celina Sinclair said what everyone in the know at the MHSAA Division 3 state track and field meet already knew: “It’s going to be neck and neck with Olivet and Lansing Catholic.”
The Eagles and Cougars were the two titans on the girls side.
Olivet had just a little more — including two seniors who finished their decorated careers with epic Saturdays at Kent City High School.
Sinclair won the 200 meters in a dead-heat with Erie Mason’s Giuliana Nastale (both in 24.91 seconds). Sinclair also anchored Olivet’s winning 400- and 800-meter relay teams and finished second in the 100-meter dash (11.92 seconds), after which she also said bluntly, “Hopefully we get first against Lansing Catholic.”
Peters was just as brilliant. She was on those two winning relay teams and won a state championship in the 300-meter hurdles (44.00) for the fourth straight year, five days after she clipped a hurdle and fell at the Honor Roll Meet.
“(That fall) just reminded me that it’s not guaranteed,” said Peters, who also finished second in the 100 hurdles (14.83) on Saturday. “Just can’t get complacent. You have to keep working and not take for granted all these races, because you never know what could happen.”
Peters and Sinclair combined to score 56 points, leading Olivet to 82 total points and their second straight team championship. They had the title wrapped up before the final event, the 1,600 relay, which Lansing Catholic won to get to 76 points. The Eagles had to have it wrapped by then.
“We didn’t have anyone left who would be able to compete,” Olivet coach Brian Lincoln said. “So we knew we had to be up 10 points coming out of the two-mile, and we were up 16.”
There was a lot of strategy coming in — all with an eye on besting Lansing Catholic.
“We knew were were gong to load the 4X200, and we were trying to figure out if we were going to put Emily in the long jump and Celina in the 400, or did we want to load the 4X100,” Lincoln said. “And we thought our safest best was going after the 4X100. … It worked out.”
Also in those loaded relays for Olivet: Bailey Powell and Lola Miars on the first two legs of the 400 relay and Kendall Eggerstedt and Miars on the middle two legs of the 800 relay. Sophomore Tiya Feldpausch had a pretty dang good day, too, finishing second in the 3,200-meter run, third in the 1,600 and fourth in the 800. Freshman Lily Britton helped the Eagles’ cause by finishing fifth in the 800 and eighth in the 3,200.
Peters wound up being all-state 16 times in four years, including 10 state titles. Sinclair finished with nine state titles for her career, the 200 meters Saturday her first outside of a relay.
“I’ve done my job today,” she said after hanging on for a share of the 200-meter title against the fast-charing Nastale.
Lansing Catholic’s Grace Wonch and Josie Bishop might have similarly dazzling resumes by the time they’re done. They dominated the middle- and long-distance races Saturday, leading the Cougars to a second-place finish with 66 points.
Wonch, a junior, and Bishop, a sophomore, pushed each other in the 1,600, with Wonch finishing five-hundredths of a second in front at 4:58:84, the two of them more than seven seconds ahead of the third-pace finisher.
“Our plan was to run together,” Wonch said. “And at that point, we don’t even think about which one of us is going to win. We just think about that we’re going to win together. And that’s always been the plan.”
They won on their own, too — with Wonch winning the 3,200 meters by a ways (in 10:53.12), and Bishop taking the 800 (2:16.07), with Wonch in third.
Wonch won the 3,200, the last of her three races, by letting her nearest competitor set the pace and then “trusting in my kick for the rest.”
“I was already tired from previous races, so I wasn’t super eager to go out on my own,” Wonch said. “Just decided I needed to pick a spot to turn it on.”
Bishop’s win in the 800 was tighter, but with a similar strategy.
“I was trying to sit back and let that girl do all the work and not go too early,” said Bishop, who also finished seventh in the 400. “And at the finish line, I was just trying to give all I had.”
Lansing Catholic also got 10 points from its 1,600-meter relay team, which won the meet’s final race, anchored by Bishop. That foursome — beginning with Frances Melinn, Stella Gates and Isabelle Currie — beat Pewamo-Westphalia’s Leah Miller, Calista George, Julia Paxton and Elly Bengel by just over a second.
Paxton and George were part of the P-W team that won the 3,200-meter relay — along with Katherine Schafer and Adelyn Thelen — just ahead of the Lansing Catholic foursome of Melinn, Lindsey Ludwig, Currie and Anna Drauer. Bengel finished third on her own in the 400 meters.
P-W junior Alyssa Kramer was the closest challenge to Wonch and Feldpausch in the 3,200, finishing third.
The Pirates’ star of the day, however, was senior thrower Jenna Spitzley, who scored 18 of P-W’s 61.5 points, enough for third place at the meet by more than double the next team. Spitzley won the discus at 136-7, and finished second in the shot put at 38-1.75, only behind Montrose’s Addyson Stiverson, who’s setting records in the event and threw 55-6.5.
“I felt really good,” Spitzley said, despite throwing with a tailwind, which hurt her a chance of a PR in the discus.
“We didn’t think we’d contend for a trophy (as a team), so where we are right now, I’m very proud of that.”
Ithaca senior Izabelle LaLone was the only other area athlete on the girls side with a top-three finish, taking second in the 400 meters.
Lansing Catholic’s VanAlstine wins two state titles
Nobody had a better day individually than Lansing Catholic senior Leland VanAlstine, who won both hurdle events in the boys meet, beginning with the 110-meter hurdles in 14.19 seconds, close to a half-second ahead of his nearest competitor.
“All through the season, that was main goal, to win this race,” VanAlstine said, after finishing second in the 110 hurdles a year ago.
He won the 300 hurdles, too (in 39 second flat), helped perhaps by one of his top competitors taking a tumble after tripping on a hurdle.
“I did see him off to my side fall and knew I had to keep pushing,” VanAlstine said. “(I thought) ‘Keep pushing and keep form and try not to hit (the hurdle).
“To complete both of those is a really good feeling.”
Lansing Catholic’s 30 points overall were the most of any Lansing area school in the boys meet. Monroe St. Mary won the meet with 39 points. Second-place Elk Rapids was just two points ahead of Lansing Catholic with 32.
Perry had a good day in the field events — with senior Alex McEwan taking second in the discus (159-8) and senior Chandler Webb finishing second in the pole vault, reaching 14-9.
Ovid-Elsie senior Brock Spitzley took third in the discus (158-1), and the Pewamo-Westphalia 400-meter relay team of Carter Thelen, Caleb Blyth, Blake Thelen and Alex Nurenberg finished third.
Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on X @Graham_Couch and BlueSky @GrahamCouch.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: D-3 state track: Sinclair, Peters propel Olivet girls to second straight title; Lansing Catholic’s VanAlstine wins two state titles
Reporting by Graham Couch, Lansing State Journal / Lansing State Journal
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