Also serving the communities of De Luz, Rainbow, Camp Pendleton, Pala and Pauma
Also serving the communities of De Luz, Rainbow, Camp Pendleton, Pala and Pauma
Jason Nguyen of the FHS varsity track team takes second place in the shot put event during a meet with Valley Center. Fallbrook won 83-53. Ken Seals photo
Andy Iniesta leaps off the mark in the long jump at the track meet at Fallbrook’s field on April 23. Iniesta finished third in the event.
Fallbrook pole vaulter Elijah Zepeda takes off on a vault during the track meet with Valley Center. Zepeda took first place in the Varsity pole vault event. Fallbrook coach Jim Curran watches.
The sand flies as FHS long jumper Austin Williams completes a jump during a track meet with Valley Center on April 23. Williams finished second in the long jump event.
Mikey Sykes easily clears the high jump bar for Fallbrook in the track meet with Valley Center, taking first place in the varsity high jump event.
Jack Jones, center, wins the varsity 100 meter dash for the Fallbrook track team on Apr. 23. Fallbrook runner Christian Contreras is at right.
FHS runners Robert Ramirez, left and John Pease take first and second respectively in the Varsity 300 meter hurdles on April 23 during a match with Valley Center.
Fallbrook runner Jack Jones, center, finishes first in the Varsity 200 meter dash at the FHS – Valley Center track meet on Apr. 23. Other Warriors in the event are, Matthew Kinze, second from left and Julian Arteaga, right.
Jack Jones takes the baton from Sierra Arteaga on the anchor leg of the Varsity four by 400 yard relay on April 23. Fallbrook won the relay and the Varsity men’s portion of the meet 83 – 53.
An individual athlete in a high school track and field meet is allowed to compete in up to four events. Fallbrook High School head coach Marco Arias along with the Warrior team as a whole took advantage of that versatility April 9 when the Warriors opened Valley League competition with a home dual meet against Orange Glen and defeated the Patriots by an 82-53 score.
"A lot of the guys are working their way to becoming multiple event guys," Arias said. "They are moving up to the challenge."
A high school meet begins with the 4x100 relay. Oscar Ruvalcaba normally participates in that event for Fallbrook but was ill. Austin Williams has earned points for Fallbrook in the shot put and discus but is also on the Warriors' football team, and some of the Warrior runners who also play football recommended that Williams be used as Ruvalcaba's replacement.
"He's been asking to run the 100. He's quite an athlete, but we needed him up top," Arias said.
"Up top" refers to the throwing circle; the timing of the events gave Williams an extremely short period between the end of the 4x100 and the start of the shot put throw. The absence of Ruvalcaba gave Arias no other option. "He went down and helped the relay team anchor that victory," Arias said.
Roberto Ramirez, Matt Kinzie, Jack Jones, and Williams won the 4x100 with a hand-held time of 45.0 seconds. Williams then made the trip to the shot put circle and won that event with a throw of 41'1". Jason Nguyen threw the shot put 37'4" to give the Warriors a third-place point. Nguyen won the discus throw with a toss of 114'0"; Williams was third at 106'6".
Only the first relay runner begins on the starting block; the other three take the baton from a standing position. The 100-meter dash requires a starting technique as well as sprinting and finishing techniques. Jones won that event in 11.2 seconds and Kinzie finished second at 11.4 seconds. Freshman Julian Arteaga ran his first varsity race and was third with a time of 11.7 seconds.
Arias expects Arteaga to be part of the Warriors' future. "We just didn't know he was going to blossom this season," Arias said. "He's been growing leaps and bounds on a weekly basis."
Arias will also be evaluating the 2015 future of Christian Contreras, who won the junior varsity 100-meter race with a time of 11.6 seconds.
For individual events, five points are given to the school with the first-place time or distance, three points are awarded for second place, and the third-place mark is worth one point. Roberto Ramirez gave Fallbrook five points with a long jump of 20 feet 11 1/2 inches, which set a personal record.
Ramirez also sought to help the team in the 300-meter hurdles. Fallbrook's John Pease won that race in 43.1 seconds and Jack Grantham placed third with a time of 45.9 seconds. Ramirez, who had never previously run a hurdles race and had practiced for approximately 15 minutes, was challenging Pease for the lead before hitting the sixth and seventh hurdles. He fell both times but got back up and had a time of 46.9 seconds not including the penalties for knocking over the hurdles.
"He's phenomenal," Arias said of Ramirez. "Anything we put him in, he's going to excel in. He's quite talented."
Pease also won the 110-meter hurdles with a time of 16.9 seconds. Elijah Roque won two distance races for Fallbrook, completing the 800-meter event in 2:06.1 and the 1,600-meter run in 4:37.9. Sam Comerford gave Fallbrook second-place points in the 1,600-meter race with a time of 4:49.9. Arias isn't concerned that the Warriors' 1,600-meter times were slower than normal, as the athletes were running into a headwind while on the backstretch. "Eli ran what he needed to do," Arias said of Roque's winning time.
The Warriors took the top two 1,600-meter positions March
26 at Mission Hills; Roque had a time of 4:34.0 and Comerford completed the race in 4:40.2. Roque had a second-place time of 2:00.0 in the 800-meter race at Mission Hills. Pease was running into a headwind at Mission Hills when he won the 100-meter hurdles in 17.4 seconds and the 300-meter hurdles in 43.8 seconds. The Grizzlies won that meet by a 90-45 score.
On March 28, Roque ran the 800-meter race at the Sundevil Invitational meet at Mount Carmel High School and finished 13th with a personal record of 1:59.2.
Comerford won the 3,200-meter event April 9 in 10:54.5 with Wade Leehey posting the third-place time of 11:29.3.
Elijah Zepeda cleared 11'0" to win the pole vault with Anthony Sepulveda placing third at 10'0". Mikey Sykes won the high jump with a height of 6'0".
In the 400-meter race, Orange Glen's Oscar Palomares and Fallbrook's Sierra Arteaga both had times of 52.0 seconds; the race was decided on the lean with Palomares taking first place and Arteaga placing second. Palomares also won the 200-yard dash, posting a time of 23.2 seconds, but Jones was second at 23.7 seconds and Kinzie had the third-place time of 23.8 seconds while Julian Arteaga finished fourth 24.3 seconds after the race began.
Andy Iniesta had a triple jump of 37 feet 9 1/2 inches for second place.
"It's always nice to start off league with a win," Arias said.
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