Earlier this season, Moorpark High sprints coach Phyllis Alexander promised her team any athlete to set a school record would see their achievement celebrated with a postseason barbecue at her home.
Nobody would have guessed the guest list would be in the double digits.
Ten different Musketeers have broken a total of 11 school records already this spring campaign, a stunning achievement for the program. Alexander wouldn’t mind if even a few more table settings were added before the year is through — the more the merrier.
“It’s all starting to come together,” Alexander said. “The momentum is growing. They realize the sky is the limit. They can accomplish whatever they set their minds to.”
The Musketeers have set school records in the boys and girls 200 meters, the girls 400 meters, the boys and girls 4×100 meter relays, the girls 1,600 meters, the girls and boys long jump, the boys high jump, and the boys 110-meter and 300-meter hurdles this spring.
An established multi-event star in junior Davis Benson leads the way for the boys team, with his fingerprints on four of those records, while freshman sprint phenom Camilla Peltonen has set records in both long sprints and as a part of the 4×100 relay for the girls team.
The pair have been the foundation of a record-breaking season with momentum that seems bent on building.
“You always have the one off, you have the Davis Benson who, you know, breaks a couple school records by himself,” Moorpark head coach Christian Dearborn said. “But it’s crazy, like, it’s not one person breaking records. Granted, Davis has a couple records, Camilla has a couple records, but just seeing a bunch of different names all happening in one year is (something).”
Benson said the talent and the drive across Moorpark’s roster this year has built a culture of competitiveness in training that has transformed the team’s energy.
“Iron sharpens iron, and … the environment here is, we all want to get better,” Benson said. “I think that’s part of the success — we all push each other so much. … If we train like the best, we’ll eventually be the best.
At the prestigious Mt. SAC Invitational, senior high jumper Dean Guzman cleared the bar set at 7 feet, becoming one of just 14 high schoolers in the country to do so this season.
At the same meet, Peltonen ran 55.75 seconds in the 400 meters to become the fourth-fastest freshman in the event in California this season.
It hasn’t just been at the big meets. The Musketeers have shown up with some of their best performances even without a stadium of fans watching.
Peltonen and fellow sprinter Jalen Aguilar-Carnes shattered records in the girls and boys 200 meters, respectively, mere minutes apart from one another on the way to defeating Coastal Canyon League rival Oak Park on April 15 on their home track.Aguilar-Carnes ran a 21.34, while Peltonen closed in at 24.13. Long jumper Gianna Gonzalez, also a member of the 4×100 relay, leapt to a mark of 18-7.25 in the long jump to set a record of her own at the same meet.
Peltonen, the younger sister of Moorpark soccer player and University of North Dakota commit Linnea Peltonen, said the dominoes of the team’s confidence began to fall early in the season and have never stopped.
“For the (4×100), when we first started racing, we were like, ‘Wait, we’re really close to school records,’ so we just were getting really excited for the upcoming meets,” Peltonen said. “Then we broke it. That started a chain reaction — another one and another one.”
“When you see someone else have success, it pushes you to be better,” added Benson. “And when a bunch of people are succeeding, I mean, it just helps the whole environment be better. … We’re all performing very great right now. We are all super grateful for that.”
Junior distance runner Jenna Murray’s time of 10:46.79 set a record in the 3,200 meters at the Simi Valley Invitational on March 28, where she was joined by Benson’s long jump of 23-6, another school record.
The girls and boys 4×100 meter relays — which include Payton Sustin, Kade Hunter, Benson and Aguilar-Carnes for the boys and Isabella Sanabria Cora, Jackie Hatcher, Peltonen and Gonzalez for the girls — have slashed their times substantially to become the No. 3 and No. 2 teams in Ventura County this season.
“We are proud to be Musketeers. We are proud to be a part of Moorpark,” Sanabria Cora said. “We are here to get better and fight for everything that we have.”
Moorpark will take on the area’s best in its home stadium on Friday, April 24, at the Ventura County Track and Field Championships.
Dominic Massimino is a staff writer for The Star. He can be reached at dominic.massimino@vcstar.com. For more coverage, follow @vcsdominic on Twitter and Instagram.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Moorpark track sets a new standard in record-breaking season
Reporting by Dominic Massimino, Ventura County Star / Ventura County Star
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