Jake Heslington and Conner Mantz should have some great battles this weekend at the Utah State Track Championships- Photo by Kyle Perry
Woods Cross is the heavy favorite for the state meet this weekend. With their power and depth in the sprinting events, it doesn’t appear anyone will be anywhere near them. Derek Lord, Sean Barton, Jacopo Spano and Cam Dopp lead this sprint corps and should lead them back home with a state championship trophy. The race seems to really be for second place. Herriman has a lot of quality athletes that should be able to score a lot of points and potentially grab that second place trophy.
Here we give the top athletes to watch for in each event.
100m
Spano, Lord and Barton could very well sweep this event. Stetson Startor from Herriman and Garrett England from Skyview should also be factors and will hope to break up the scoring by Woods Cross.
200m
Jacopo Spano broke the state record at the BYU Invite two weeks ago. He was pushed by Josh Espinoza from Timpview who will likely be his stiffest competition again this week.
400m
Espinoza and Spano could meet again in the 400m. In this event, Espinoza holds a slightly better mark with a 48.79 to Spano’s 48.92.
800m
This should be a very exciting race between Westlake’s Austin Brower, Timpanogos’ Jake Heslington and Maple Mountain’s Isaac Faux. Heslington has the state championship experience and he split 1:52 this year in a relay split. Much will depend on how the 3200 and 1600 play out to see if Heslington can win the shorter distance.
1600m
Heslington and Brower will also face off in the 1600. Heslington has the best time within state boundaries out of any of the athletes in the meet and should win what looks like his strongest event. You can never count out Conner Mantz though, as there might not be anyone more gutsy or tough than the Skyview sophomore.
3200m
As the defending state champion and the fastest seed time, Heslington should repeat. But once again, don’t count out Conner Mantz. The footlocker finalist doesn’t want to wait until his senior year to win his first state title.
110m hurdles
Conner Jensen has the best seed time going into the meet, but Taylor Allen of Herriman and Cam Dopp of Woods Cross have also gone under 15 seconds this year. Dopp might have some extra motivation as his team is going for the team title.
300m hurdles
Cam Dopp is the favorite in the intermediate hurdles as the only runner to go under 40 seconds on the year, but he is followed closely by Tyler Diaz of Westlake who has a 40.09 to his name.
4x100m relay
Barring disaster, Woods Cross should run away with this one. Nearly every time they've stepped on the track this season they've broken their own state record. With good weather conditions and consistent handoffs, that record could go down again. Timpview has the second fastest time of the year, but is nearly a full second behind.
4x400m relay
Woods Cross also has the fastest seed time in the 4x400m relay, but not by much. Woods Cross ran 3:25.75 at a home meet in April and Mt. View ran 3:25.95 at BYU two weeks ago. If both teams run their top athletes, it could be an incredible race.
Sprint Medley Relay
Timpanogos and Herriman have the top two times in this event, but Timpanogos is seeded five seconds ahead. It will be interesting to see if Timpanogos runs their best team, or if Jake Heslington will be putting his focus into other events. If Heslington does not run, Herriman has a good shot at the win.
High Jump
Anthony Gregory from Roy has the top mark in the entire state this year at 6’10”. He has four inches on the next best competitor, Jadon Pace of Mt. View.
Long Jump
Murray’s Bradford Strobell jumped 22’1.75” last week at his region meet, but he’s still nearly a foot behind Jacopo Spano from Woods Cross. Spano should win this event as well. He could potentially score 40 points for Woods Cross, and will likely score at least 30.
Shot Put
Seth White from Skyview and Andre James from Herriman are the top two athletes in the shot put. White threw 54’8.5” while James went 52’10.5”. If one has a poor day, expect to see the other on top of the podium.
Discus
Rory Mulitalo of Herriman has thrown 156 feet this year and will try to hold off Seth White from Skyview along with Dallin Dahl and his own teammate Nicholas Merriman.
Javelin
Colby Taylor of Bountiful has the best mark coming in with his throw of 160’1”. Chad Weight of Salem Hills is right behind him with 159’3”.
Pole Vault
Michael Harrop of Box Elder has the best mark at 12’2”. Following him are three athletes with jumps of 12’0”; Logen Fisher of Westlake, Mitch Bills of Timpanogos and Bryan Rees of Roy.