Division 3
The high-octane boys' sprints squad from Chetek-Weyerhaeuser helped earn the school a WIAA Division 3 State Championship, as they earned a majority of their 44 team points from the short sprints and relays. The Athens boys team finished runner-up, scoring 35 points, nearly all coming from their field events.
On the girls' side, Ava Washburn singlehandedly earned Webster the WIAA Division 3 Women's State Championship, as she scored all 38 of their team points throughout the weekend. Dodgeland finished as runner-up, as Miranda Firari served as a major contributor to their team's success, as they scored 37 points.
To recount all of Washburn's success from the weekend, she was a three-time state champion, earning wins in the 100m hurdles (15.39), long jump (18-11), and triple jump (38-3.25). She also got a runner-up finish in a nail-biting 300m hurdle final, running 44.98 and finishing .01 seconds behind Kendal Stingle, who earned the state championship.
On the distance side of things, there were not one, but two triple crown winners in sweeping the 800m, 1600m, and 3200m in one weekend.
On the women's side, Kayci Martensen employed a similar strategy in the 1600m and 3200m, waiting until late in the race to make some huge moves and break open the field, giving her convincing wins. In the 800m, however, Autumn Michalski and Jenna Anders played big challengers to Martensen all the way through, but Martensen was ultimately able to hold out, completing the triple crown along the way.
Her times for each of her events: 2:17.47 in the 800m, 4:57.05 in the 1600m, and 10:59.07 in the 3200m. This was Martensen's second year in a row completing the triple crown, giving her a total of eight state titles on the outdoor track in her career at Benton-Scales Mound-Shullsburg.
Very similarly, Parker Schneider of Durand also walked away from the weekend with three shiny new state titles in the distance events.
He started off hot in the 1600m, pulling away midway through to run 4:17.79. Then, going after a hot pace in the 800m, secured the Division 3 state record in that event, running 1:54.29 for another convincing win. The next day in the 3200m, even with some fierce competition from McDonell's Dan Anderson, Schneider closed his final 400m in a wild 57.3, ultimately running 9:18.51 to garner a massive PR and his final title of the weekend.
Miranda Firari of Dodgeland was a huge contributor for her team this weekend, and was quite busy with competition as well. She came away with wins in the 200m (26.07) and pole vault (11-9), along with finishing 2nd in both the 100m (12.83) as well as on the 4x400m relay.
Cade Stingle, brother of hurdle champion Kendal Stingle, cleaned up on the boys' side of Division 3 hurdles, earning state championships in both the 110m hurdles (15.01) and 300m hurdles (38.57).
Athens' success in the field events was bolstered very strongly by the boys' pole vault, as teammates Caden Decker and Ryan Peel went 1-2 to earn 18 team points in the event. Decker had himself a day, winning the event by 21 inches, which he cleared five additional heights when the rest of the field was already out of the competition.