Met with beautiful weather a short drive up the interstate into the mountains, Eagles met Wildcats on on the grey Mondo surface for an incredibly successful dual meet. Boys were able to take home 4 individual event victories while the girls had 11 event victories and the TEAM victory.

Starting with the field, Mercedes Tinder continues her tear in the throws, this time adding javelin to the mix. She was able to take the triple crown of shot put, discus, and javelin with throws of 33’1″, 77’9″, and 80’9″ respectively. Mercedes did this with this also being her first ever time competing in javelin. Congrats to her continued success! In the vertical jumps, Rebekah Oberlander and Courtney Smith continue their pole vaulting and high jumping success, with Rebekah vaulting 10′ and Courtney leaping 4’8″.

To the track, the day started out with success in the 4x200m with Anna Boone, Daytona Crow, Sy’nia Williams and Emma Wijsman taking the W in 1:50.24, another season’s best for this relay. Continued depth was shown off in the 4x200m, as our “B” TEAM finished second only to the “A” TEAM, running 1:56.60 by Tayten Walcott, Greta Cavotta, Trinity Cress, and Sophia Mydlil. Nice job Eagles!

Freshman Arryana Gandhi won the 100m hurdles in her first individual win of the season in a time of 21.17. She currently sits as the 7th fastest freshman in Kingco. Senior Emma Wijsman also topped the 100m in a new PR of 13.15. This places her at 6th overall in Kingco — an awesome accomplishment!

The men’s 1600m saw 3 Eagles atop the rankings, with Connor Rickey, Brennen Rickey, and Joshua Delgadillo all running stellar races while dealing with the wind. Freshman Connor Rickey sealed the win with a time of 4:33.70, which ranks him 7th in Kingco and the fastest freshman in 4A state. Great job Connor! Not to be outdone was the girl’s 1600m, which saw sophomore Jane Harig run a near personal best solo effort 5:29.76, which comes a week after her 5:26.68 that put her at 12th overall in Kingco in the 1600m. Awesome job by Jane to continue growing as one of our standout distance stars!

The men’s 400m was taken in a smoking time of 53.11 by senior Caleb Murphy, who was followed closing behind by sophomore Grayson Pike in 53.67. These were new PRs for both gentlemen, finding themselves as newly minted staples of our 4x400m squad–great job to them. Freshman Toren Garcia and senior Kiera Hanson both won the 300m hurdles, Toren running 45.29 and Kiera running a PR of 51.67. Toren also sits as the 3rd fastest freshman in 4A state over the 300m hurdles and 4th fastest in the 110m hurdles–a great indicator of future success. Congrats to our hurdlers!

Kate Yahn stormed to victory in the women’s 800m, blazing her way to a 2:19.91, showing her range in the distance events. This time in the 800m places her on top of the rankings in Kingco and 7th in 4A state. This goes along with her 4th place ranking in 4A state in the 3200. This was a tour de force by Kate, and we are excited to see her moving forward!

To close out the meet, the men’s 4x400m of Greyson Pike, Connor Rickey, Brennen Rickey, and Joshua Delgadillo ran a stellar time of 3:44.24 to win the race, which showed how much potential this group has to make waves in this event as we go on in the season.

Final TEAM standings saw Issaquah women winning in style, racking up 81 total TEAM points. As we look at our TEAM as a whole, we saw 117 personal bests — which are personal victories that can be taken as individual wins as well. One of these personal bests that I want to highlight is freshman Yufan Matthew Shi–who broke 3 minutes for the very first time today in the 800m–his final time being 2:59.30. As stated before, this was a personal victory that he was able to achieve by being the best Matthew he could be today. Many other Eagles saw this personal win as well, and we are so proud of all of them for making strides towards their ultimate personal goals!

Issaquah will take a select invitational travel squad to the Birger Solberg Invitational this Saturday April 9th, hosted by Sehome HS at Civic Stadium in Bellingham, WA. Wheels up for that trip is at 7:15AM, don’t be late! And bring your rain gear! Thanks for reading — Fly Eagles, Fly!