Lady Warriors start season by winning the Glen Legler Early Bird meet

Wasting little time, the Worland High School track and field team opened their season with a great showing at the Glen Legler Early Bird meet at Natrona High School in Casper on March 16.

The Lady Warriors not only won their opening meet of the season but did so convincingly. Worland scored 140.50 points to finish first, 4A Natrona County was second with 111 points, and Lander was third with 90.50 points.

Even down a few athletes, the Warriors finished fifth with 45 points. 4A Natrona County won the boys with 183.50 points, Kelly Walsh was second with 91.16 points, and Rock Springs and Riverton tied for 77 points.

"It was a good day," said WHS track and field coach Tracey Wiley. "It starts with the upperclassmen. They know I preach it doesn't matter who you're running against and the younger kids see that and do the same. They were all so competitive, and it all starts with those seniors and juniors."

Worland also had multiple athletes automatically qualify for the 3A State tournament in May.

For the Lady Warriors, Kalistynn Crippen qualified in the high jump (4-11), 100-meter dash (12.72), 200-meter dash (25.80); Anna Richardson in the high jump (5-01) and 100-meter hurdles (16.74); Maddy Lloyd in the 100-meter dash (12.99) and 200-meter dash (26.52); Cherise Douzenis in the 400-meter dash (1:00.85) and long jump (17-5).

Douzenis also nearly broke the school record in the long jump.

The Lady Warriors also had three relays - the 4x100-meter relay (Maddy Lloyd, Kalistynn Crippen, Nyssa Leyva, Erika Manahan), 4x400-meter relay (Adisyn Rollins, Erika Manahan, Timber Decker, Nyssa Leyva) and sprint medley relay (Maddy Lloyd, Maci Newell, Adisyn Rollins, Zena Tapia) - qualify for state too.

The Lady Warriors also swept the 200-meter dash with Crippen, Douzenis and Lloyd going one, two, three.

"It was funny because with the 4x1, there was only one other team running. I told them they had to race against themselves. They wanted that AQ and wanted to beat their record time of 49 last year. Their handoffs were pretty good, but they still got the AQ at 50.54. I was really impressed with that.

"Going one, two, three in the 200 was amazing. Anna keeps building off the confidence she got from indoor. Now she's consistently jumping over 5-foot," said Wiley. "Cherise got it in the 400, and she just launched one in the long jump. It was her last jump of the day, and she went 17-05. We told her she needed to reach more, which she did, and now she's close to the school record, which is 17.05.5."

Highlighting the Lady Warriors depth was their 4x4 relay team. Junior Shae Whitlock is out with an injury, but freshman Timber Decker stepped up and helped the team qualify.

"We just threw together a girls 4x4, and we were missing Shae Whitlock, who is out with an injury. We put Timber Decker in the 4x4 and they AQ'd in that. Shae's been battling an injury, and we can't wait to have her back because she's a competitor and a huge part of this team," said Wiley.

For the Warriors, Trajn Swalstad and Dawson Utterback hit qualifying marks in their events. Swalstad qualified in the 3200-meter run (10:07.14) and Utterback in the 300-meter hurdles (42.36)

Swalstad was the first Worland athlete to qualify, while Utterback, had contemplated sitting out the 300-meter hurdles due to shin splints. However, the senior ultimately gave it a shot and qualified.

"Trajn got us started by getting the AQ in the 3200, and it just took off from there," said Wiley. "Dawson is battling through some shin splints, and we talked about maybe not doing the 300s that day to heal his shins. Next thing I know, he's warming up and went and AQ'd in the 300s."

With the exciting start to the season, the Worland athletes got right back to work this week in practice as they prepare for today's meet in Cody.

The competitive streak that runs through the entire team already has many of the Worland athletes determined to one-up their performance in Casper.

"This competitiveness will carry them through to regionals. It's nice to get that AQ because you're guaranteed to go, but even if they don't you know they're going to do what it takes to get in that top eight at regionals.

"Starting practice this week, I asked if they were content with that one good meet or are they going to push themselves even more. We don't settle. That's not in our nature. We want to keep setting PRs every meet. They've bought into that and got right back to work on Monday. We're striving to get better every day and May is our goal," said Wiley.

The Worland point scorers from the Glen Legler Early Bird meet are as follows:

LADY WARRIORS

100-meter dash

2, Kalistynn Crippen, 12.72

5, Maddy Lloyd, 12.99

200-meters dash

1, Kalistynn Crippen, 25.80

2, Cherise Douzenis, 26.25

3, Maddy Lloyd, 26.52

400-meter dash

4, Cherise Douzenis, 1:00.85

800-meter

5, Zena Tapia, 2:39.45

1600-meter

1, Zena Tapia, 5:39.19

3200-meter

2, Ava Tapia, 12:27.08

100-meter hurdles

4, Anna Richardson, 16.74

300-meter hurdles

3, Anna Richardson, 50.68

High jump

2, Anna Richardson, 5-1

3, Kalistynn Crippen, 4-11

4, Erika Manahan, 4-9

Long jump

2, Cherise Douzenis, 17-05

7, Erika Manahan, 15-11

Triple jump

2, Madilyn Glanz, 32-9.25

Discus

5, Manaia Peterson, 107-7

WARRIORS

800-meter

3, Trajn Swalstad, 2:09.51

1600-meter

6, Ivan Thomas, 5:05.21

8, Krew Neighbors, 5:07.40

3200-meter

2, Trajn Swalstad, 10:07.14

8, Will Bishop, 10:37.70

110-meter hurdles

7, Dawson Utterback, 16.93

300-meter hurdles

4, Dawson Utterback, 42.36

Pole vault

8, Dawson Utterback, 10-0