West Liberty High School girls' track and field

West Liberty girls shine in Wilton

Senior leads Comets with pair of firsts

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Winning three firsts including a pair of individual honors by senior Macy Daufeldt, the West Liberty High School girls’ track and field team finished ninth overall in the 11-team Kreimeyer Relays Monday, April 11 in Wilton.

The Comet 4 x 100 meter shuttle relay team of Sydney Rivera, Rylee Goodale, Laney Esmoil and Macy Daufeldt finished second in a new school record time of 1:10.68, just short of Cascade’s state best 1:09.33, but well ahead of Durant’s third place showing of 1:16.47, followed closely by Iowa City Regina. It was one of three relay teams competing in the meet for coach Michael Hart and coach Hart said the performance dropped the Comets to a third place best in the state. He said the team has a goal of qualifying for the Drake Relays in the event.

Daufeldt proved her dominance in the 100-meter hurdles as well as the long jump, taking firsts in both events as the senior leaped 16-02.50 feet to claim the long jump title by nearly a foot over Wilton’s Catie Hock.

The Drake University recruit then ran a 15:64 in the 100-meter hurdles to take down a field of 17 athletes, more than a half second ahead of Devin Simon, a junior from Cascade that finished in 16:34.

West Liberty had a few surprising performances including a fourth place long jump finish from freshman Pearson Hall, leaping 15-02.25 while Sydney Rivera, a junior, claimed sixth place honors in the 100 meter hurdles with a time of 17.78. Coach Hart complimented Hall’s performance, Pearson is long jumping really well this year, noting she has gone 15’ 11.5”. “I know she was disappointed with her marks from Monday, but that’s a tough pit to jump in over there at Wilton,” he said.

The 4 x 100 relay team of Sydney Rivera, Alissa Sanchez, Pearson Hall and Macy Daufeldt

claimed a third place honor in the meet with a time of 54.81, less than four-tenths of a second behind first place Wilton and two-tenths of a second behind Durant. Coach Hart said it was the first time the foursome ran with that lineup, noting “a couple handoff miscues hindered the time a bit but I’m excited for what that crew can do on a clean run.”

The West Liberty 4 x 200-meter relay team finished sixth in the meet with a time of 2:00.88, well behind the first place effort of Davenport North at 1:52.71. The team consisted of Pearson Hall, Rylee Goodale, Laney Esmoil and Alissa Sanchez.

“That crew gave us a great effort. A couple of them definitely don’t consider themselves 200 runners so it was good to see them stick their necks in there and compete hard,” the coach said. “Alissa Sanchez has shown tremendous improvement from last year to this year. She has become an extremely valuable member of a lot of our relays and is running really tough.”

In other field events, senior Grace Event finished sixth in the discus with a toss of 84-04 feet for the Comets while she placed seventh in the shot put, tossing the ball 27-07 feet.

In other individual running performances for West Liberty, Ava Morrison was ninth in the 800 meters with a time of 2:53.12 while sophomore Lila Guerra was 17th in the same event in 3:11.

Guerra also finished 11th in the 1500 meter run in a time of 7:03 while Addision Beaver was 19th in the 800 meters in 3:18.

Sydney Rivera, a junior, placed sixth for the Comets in the 100-meter hurdles, finishing in 17.78.

The coach said he had a limited team due to a conflicting soccer match and state FFA convention, but said Sammi Goodale ran her first 400 hurdles and finished ninth in 1:08.44. “I’m really excited what she can do in that event as the season goes on. The first crack at that race is always tough on you, but she’s excited to get back after it,” the coach said.

Daufeldt finished the day second in medal counts, outdone only by Kaylee Corbin, a senior from Louisa-Muscatine who finished with three firsts.

“Overall I think it was a good showing. The ones that were there competed very well,” Hart said. “We got to see quite a few times that will compete very highly at the state level. As of Monday us and Cascade were 1st and 2nd in the state for shuttle head to head and Macy got to compete against the only girl in 2A with a faster 100 hurdles time than her. Excited to compete again and even more excited to see some better weather… eventually.”

Northeast won the meet overall with a point count of 94, well ahead of Davenport North with 83 and Maquoketa with 80.

Wilton, Cascade, Regina, Louisa-Muscatine, Durant, West Liberty, Midland and Marquette Catholic all followed in that order.

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