Several Turpin athletes competed at OSU's French Field House on Saturday in the high school track meet as part of the Arnold Sports Festival.

[Complete results]

Video: Arnold meets with the Uhle brothers from Olentangy Liberty.  Chris Uhle cleared 17-3 in the pole vault on Saturday, bettering his own state record and coming within inches of the national indoor record.

In the last two weeks of the track season, Turpin's Track teams have travelled to Sycamore, Kings, and Mason's home fields to compete against some of the best teams in the city.  In order to prepare themselves for the Fort Ancient Valley Conference Cardinal meet on Tuesday May 11th and Thursday May 13th, the Spartans faced off against conference rival Kings, previously faced Sycamore, and the powerful Mason team to judge how far along Turpin has come.  A recap for each meet is now in order.

On April 27th, Turpin went into the prestigious Sycamore Golden Baton Relayslooking to avenge their loss to Sycamore a week earlier at the Milford Invitational.  The guys did just that, and ended up winning the meet with the 4by400 race; edging out second place Lakota West by one point.  The Turpin girls got 5th out of 8 teams, but used the meet to improve their times significantly.  Notable placing in the relays/field events were:  Matt Olsson's 1st place in the pole vault, Hannah Zimmerman's 2nd place pole vault, Andrew Flohr and Jeff Groene going 1-2 in the Discus throw, Groene and Chris Cooper's 2-3 in the shotput, the 4by1600 2nd place finish, the Shuttle Hurdles relay's 1st place win, the 4by800's 2nd place finish, the 3by300 hurdles relay's win, and the 4by400's 2nd place win in the last race of the day.  

On May 4th, the King's Invitational featured teams from Mason, Lakota West, St. Ursula, and, of course, Kings in order to give the Spartans good competition.  The guys came in third overall, behind Mason and Lakota West, beating out Kings by 4.5 points.  The girls came in 4th behing Kings, Mason, and St. Ursula.  Top placers for the Lady Spartans were as follows:  The girl's distance medley team's first place finish, Brittany Berry's 3rd place in the 100 meter hurdles, Carmen Versoza's third place finish in the 300 meter hurdles, Adrienne Grogan's 2nd place in the 800 meter run, Meghan Rewick's win in the high jump, and Hannah Zimmerman's 2nd place wins in the pole vault and high jump.  For the guys, top placers were:  Shade Whitfield's win in the 100 meter hurdles, the 4by200's 2nd place win, the 4by100's 2nd place finish, Brien Polivka's 3rd place finish in the 400 meter run, Joel Neuhart's 2nd place in the 300 meter hurdles, Jeff Groene's 3rd place in the shotput, and Andrew Flohr's 2nd place in the discus.

In the last meet before FAVC, the Spartans went to Comet Stadium for the Mason Invitational on May 7th.  With tough competition from teams all around the state of Ohio, Turpin did not place very well but still pulled off significant improvements in all areas of competition.  Complete results can be found at the Milesplit website.

Please support your Turpin Spartans at the Cardinal division meet at Walnut Hills high school this coming week.  On Tuesday May 11th, the 4by800 teams, the field events, and the preliminaries for the sprints will go occur.  On Thursday May 13th, every other event will have its finals and Turpin will compete for the Cardinal crown.  

In the two day Milford Invitational at Eagles Stadium, Turpin Track placed well and ran races that gave promise to the future. Competing against teams from Sycamore, Anderson, St. Ursula, and McNicholas, Turpin got a good look at what to expect in the coming weeks and learned what it would take to face these teams again at the District meet in May.

On day one, the only events scored were the fields events and the four-man mile relay team.  In shotput Jeff Groene and Kelly Ewing led the Spartan throwers with a 7th and 8th place finish, respectively, and Groene also came back to place 3rd in the discus throw while Andrew Flohr finished in 2nd overall.  Hannah Zimmerman continued to boost the Lady Spartan's total score by placing 4th in the long jump and 2nd in the pole vault.  Matt Olsson won the men's pole vault with his 12 and 1/2 finish.  Emilyse Risher and Madeline Turk tied for 4th in the high jump while Shade Whitfield placed 5th for the guys.  In the 4 by mile relay, where each member runs a mile individually, the girl's race was dominated by a strong St. Ursula "A" team, but the team of Adrienne Grogan, Alexia Yun, Cassie Bacon, and Kristen Plummer ran well enough for a 4th place 23:42.  Sycamore provided the competition in the guy's relay, winning the race in 18:54, but the combined total of Antony Parnigoni, Alex Polivka, Joe Murray, and Nicholas El-Khoury ran well enough for another 4th place finish in 19:24.

Day two started out with the 4 by 800 meter races, where the same 4 by mile team of Polivka, Parnigoni, El-Khoury, and Murray ran a decent time of 8:37 to take 3rd, and the same girl's team of Yun, Grogan, Bacon, and Plummer also took 3rd with 10:18.  Having done the preliminaries and semi-finals for the sprinting events on Thursday, the races on Friday ran only the best from the many athletes at the meet.  Freshman Brittany Berry continued to improve by qualifying to the 100 meter hurdles final individually to place 7th in 17.6.  Shade Whitfield and Joel Neuhart placed 3rd and 4th, respectively, in their hurdles race.  Another freshman sprinter, Ali Gradone, also qualified in her 100 meter race to place 7th, while Kevin Comerford ran the finals in 11.5 and 4th overall.  The guy's 4 by 200 team of Jon Risher, Charlie Ronan, Kevin Comerford, and Shade Whitfield won the race easily in 1:33.7.  Antony Parnigoni ran the mile in 4:49, good for a 6th place finish and the 4 by 100 teams of Brittany Berry, Emilyse Risher, Stephanie Valenti, Brooke Bonne, and Jon Risher, Charlie Ronan, Alec Gates, and Kevin Comerford finished in 3rd and 2nd, respectively, both by .5 seconds from the next closest team.

Adrienne Grogan and Brien Polivka qualified for the 400 meter finals, with Grogan winning the race in 1:01 and Polivka coming in 4th with a 52.8.  Carmen Versoza qualified individually to the 300 meter finals, as did Joel Neuhart and James Rohleder, and the trio came in 5th, 4th, and 7th, respectively, in their races.  Alexia Yun and Alex Polivka both came in 8th in their 800 meter runs, while Brittany Berry and Kevin Comerford came in 6th and 2nd, respectively in their 200 meter finals.  Nicholas El-Khoury, still recovering from injury, ran against Will Fisher of Loveland in the 3200 to take home a close 2nd place for the Spartans, with his time of 10:18. The final race of the night, the 4by400, decided the end result between a strong Sycamore team and the male Spartans for the meet victory.  In an extremely close race, the team of Brien Polivka, Shade Whitfield, Joel Neuhart, and Jon Risher were not able to get past Sycamore and their 3:32 lost to Sycamore's 3:31.5.  The final result of the meet: Sycamore 118, Turpin 115.  The Lady Spartans placed 5th behind Anderson.

With great competition, the Spartans times and records improved greatly and moved them closer to becoming a threat in the FAVC. This Tuesday, the Spartans will be at the Golden Baton Relays to take on Sycamore once again.  Please send any photos or questions about track to turpinrunning@yahoo.com.

In the three weeks of its season, Turpin Track has provided a lot to look forward to in the upcoming weeks.  With meets at Mason, Monroe, Reading, and the Cincinnati Coaches Classic, Turpin has had many athletes step up to take the main spots in the track and field events, and we are now able to provide a line-up of what to expect from Turpin’s varsity track teams in 2010.

In the 100 meter dash, senior Kevin Comerford and freshman Charlie Ronan are leading the sprinters for the guys while senior Brooke Bonne and sophomore Jenna Slagle compete for the girls.

Comerford also runs the 200 meter sprint with either senior Alec Gates or sophomore Brien Polivka.  Brooke Bonne and freshman Ali Gradone lead the 200 meter dash for the girls’ team.

In the 400 meter dash, Brien Polivka has been a strong leader for the Spartans.  Having been one of the two Turpin guys to qualify for the Coaches Classic finals in the beginning of April, his time of 52.7 is the time to beat.  Junior Joe Murray is filling in for senior Trace Zemites, who has been suffering from injury for the past few weeks.  Sophomore Rachel Eckert and junior Madeline Turk have been leading the 400 for the Lady Spartans.

In the 800 meter run, senior Alex Polivka runs consistently in the race.  Senior Nicholas El-Khoury, sophomore Antony Parnigoni, or Joe Murray alternate in filling in for the second position.  Senior Alexia Yun and Rachel Eckert are strong contributors for the girls.

In the mile and two mile races, Nicholas El-Khoury and Antony Parnigoni lead the distance team in times.  Sophomores Paul Rodriguez and Brandon Bodnar help fill in for the Spartans whenever necessary.  Senior Megan Plichta and junior Adrienne Grogan are the main runners for the lady distance team.

In hurdles, junior Shade Whitfield was the other qualifier for the Coaches Classic meet in his 100 meter hurdles race.  Junior James Rohleder competes in the 300 meter hurdles for the Spartans.  On the girls’ side, junior Stephanie Valenti returns for the Spartans  to compete with freshman Brittany Berry in both the 100 meter and 300 meter hurdle races.

On the field side, Seniors Chris Cooper, Jeff Groene, and junior Andrew Flohr compete in the shot put and discus events for Turpin.  High jump is lead by Shade Whitfield and long jump by junior Alex Durso.  For the Lady Spartans, senior Victoria Oakley and junior Kelly Ewing compete in shot and discus, while senior Hannah Zimmerman is a key contributor in pole vault and long jump.  Junior Meghan Rewick and sophomore Emilyse Risher are Turpin’s high jumpers. 

All of the aforementioned athletes, plus the rest of the Turpin track team who work hard for a varsity spot, make up the essence of Turpin track.  Please continue to support the Spartans and watch the Spartans run at the Turpin Come and Run this Tuesday at 4:30 in Spartan Stadium.  Expect even greater results from here on out from your Spartan team.

Turpin's last remaining runners, two relay teams and two individuals, ended their season at the regional meet held at Welcome Stadium in Dayton on Wednesday May 27, and Friday May 29.  In order to have the opportunity to run in Dayton, these runners qualified the previous week at the District Meet in Mason by placing in the top four in their respective heats.

Jon Risher, Kevin Comerford, Wayne Dunham, and John Denman made up the the boy's 4x100m relay team.  They missed qualifying for the finals by less than one second, finishing eleventh overall in 44.13 seconds.

Kaitlin Price, Lauren Young, Alexia Yun and Adrienne Grogan made up the girl's 4x800m relay team.  In Wednesday's final, they placed seventh finishing in 9:52.55.

Kaitlin Price and Lauren Young also qualified for individual events.  Price placed sixth in the 800m run with a time of 2:20.50, and Young placed eighth in the 3200m run with a time of 11:53.30.

Complete results from the regional meet can be found here.