As in the past, during "Winter" or "Indoor" Track, Cherokee focuses largely on preparation for the Spring season. Coaches concentrate on base and strength training for the distance athletes, and skills and conditioning for the sprinters, jumpers and throwers. Even so, the team participates in a number of meets -- some of which are not reported here -- for both experience and a change of pace.
Last winter, the season began with cold temperatures and gusting winds but it still was not so bad that athletes couldn't get outside and train. This winter, the temperatures have been much warmer than usual with some days reaching the lower 70s! Pessimists predict that we will pay for this gift in the future and predict ice, snow, sleet, and maybe glaciars forming in January and February but realists accept what we have and happily train in their shorts and T-shirts! GO CHEROKEE!
On December 18th, 2015, South Jersey's "lid-lifter" of the season, the Olympic Conference Meet #1, was held at the Bennett Center in Toms River, New Jersey. This meet was designed for the "experienced but rusty" or the "brand new" and most teams brought only a few athletes to compete/practice. Cherokee was one of those teams.
Cherokee opened the season's competition on the track with a nice showing in the 4 X 200m Relay by Daulton Hopkins, Terrance Graves, Matt Powell and Rob Curley taking 3rd in the event; and then Hopkins and Graves combined with Kevin Mulligan-Tinker and Dave Osterhout to take 6th in the Sprint Medley! The 4 X 800m Relay team of Cam Wilburn, Joe Thompson, Mike Algarra and David Schwartz took 5th; and the Shuttle Hurdles Relay team of Dagan Massimino, Dave Osterhout, Rico Patterson and Anthony Natali took 6th.
In the Field, Mark Kirby took 1st in the Pole Vault and Sam Kramer took 5th in the High Jump!
Further results at: NJ.MileSplit.
Our photographer missed the meet but a friend passed along this picture of Mark Kirby after the Pole Vault.
On December 22, 2015, team members traveled to the Bennett Center for what was essentialy another practice meet, the South Jersey Track Coaches Association Meet #1. Most of Cherokee's athletes were competing in their first high school meet or their first indoor meet since last year.
Still, there were some decent performances! Xavier Wingfield and Tramil Cabbagestalk looked good in the 55m Dash; and Cabbagestalk, Abu-Becker Elbanna and Brendon Fisher looked decent in their first effort over the 55m Open Hurdles in competition! Also looking respectable were the sprinters in the 200m Relay -- Colton Schneeweis, Xavier Wingfield, Andrew Thomas and Sabastian Graterol -- and those in the 400m Relay -- Ryan Belz, James Voynow, Nickolas DiConstanzo and Anton Specht.
In the Field, Shot Putters John Hemple and Adonis Giovetis made some "rust-busting" throws, and Freshman High Jumper Adam Parker did well in his event!
Details at: NJ.MileSplit.
It's one of those questions that has plagued society for well over a century: what does a photographer do when he arrives two hours early for an assignment? The answer: he wanders around shooting dead space until the action starts!
Finally, some action!
On December 30, 2015, the team bussed to the famous Armory Track and Field Center for their last meet of 2015: the Track Universe High School Invitational! It's a kinda wierd meet with hand-timing and limited posted results but it's a great opportunity to compete at "The East Coast 'Mecca' of Track and Field" and Cherokee took full advantage, setting more than 40 PR's!
On the Track, sprint highlights include some nice showings in the 55m Dash: Daulton Hopkins took 2nd, while Terrance Graves, Rob Curley, Adam Parker and Tramil Cabbagestalk set personal bests! Also, there were big improvements in the 55m High Hurdles: Rico Patterson performed best on the team, closely followed by Tramil Cabbagestalk and Abu-Becker Elbanna! In the 400m Dash, Matt Powell led the team with Chris Cato and Anton Specht just behind! Finally, in the 200m Dash, Terrance Graves led the team followed by Rico Patterson, Dan Weiss, Chris Cato, Matt Powell, Rob Curley and Daulton Hopkins!
Among the distance performers, Mike Zurzolo took 2nd and Nick Falk took 4th in the 1600m, and Mike came back to lead the team in the 800m Run!
In the Field, Mark Kirby established new PR's in the Vault and Triple Jump, while Sam Kramer, Rico Patterson and Adam Parker looked good in the High Jump! Finally, Daulton Hopkins cleared 18' in the Long Jump, and Seb Graterol and Sam Kramer followed with their own decent jumps!
Overall, the coaches highlighted the performances of Freshman Tramil Cabbagestalk, who won the three heats in which he competed, and Mark Kirby who set significant PR's in his two field events!
Unfortunately, our photographer missed the meet.
A few details are available at: NJ.MileSplit.
On January 2, 2016, a small number of team members traveled to the Bennett Center for their first meet of the new year: the South Jersey Track Coaches Association Meet #3. Essentially this was another opportunity for competitive practice but the coaches highlighted the Shuttle Hurdles Relay team, especially Anthony Natale's PR split. Also, Adam Parker and Sebastian Graterol ran well in the 55m Dash!
Our photographer missed this meet too!
Official results page at NJ.MileSplit.
On January 5, 2016, Cherokee traveled to the Bennett Center for the South Jersey Track Coaches Association Meet #4. It was a relay meet specifically designed for teams to establish seed times for the upcoming NJ State Relays.
In the Sprint events, Daulton Hopkins, Rob Curley, Terrance Graves and Dan Weiss started well by running Cherokee's fastest 4 X 200m Relay of the year, taking 7th out of 23 teams; and later Hopkins and Graves combined with Kevin Milligan-Tinker and Matt Powell to run Cherokee's fastest Sprint Medley Relay of the year, taking 11th out of 24 teams! In addition, hurdlers Becker Elbanna, Tramil Cabbagestalk, Dave Osterhout and Rico Patterson ran Cherokee's fastest Shuttle Hurdle Relay time of the year!
In the Distance events, Nick Falk, Matt Powell, Mike Zurzolo and Justin Kelly took 6th out of 25 teams in the Distance Medley Relay; and then Falk and Zurzolo teamed with Cam Willburn and Brendan Falzone to take 6th in the 4 X 800m Relay! Coach gave special props to Mike Zurzolo for his two strong 800s!
In the Field, Mark Kirby took 4th in the Pole Vault; Rico Patterson and Sam Kramer tied their PR's in the High Jump; and Sheldon Johnston PR'd in the Shot Put!
Details at: NJ.MileSplit
Daulton and Dave prep; Matt wonders what happened to his lunch.
On January 9, 2016, the team again traveled to the Bennett Center, this time for the ambitiously named Olympic Conference Winter Championships. For the vast majority of high school teams in the frigid Northeast, the winter is a time for training and not for Conference "championships." That is especially true for Cherokee as the coaches focus on "decent performances" and "improvement" and not peaking for championships.
Among the Sprint squad, Terrance Graves advanced to the Finals in the 55m Dash after beating teammate Rob Curley by just .01 in the Trials! Rico Patterson took 1st in his preliminary heat of the 55m High Hurdles, and then took 3rd in the Finals! Matt Powell, Kevin Milligan and Anton Specht looked good in the Open 400m Dash; and then Powell and Milligan returned with Graves and Patterson to take 6th in the 4 X 400m Relay!
In the Field, the big news came from Senior John Hemple who won the Shot Put competition with his best throw ever indoors! Also, in the Shot Put, Junior Adonis Giovetis matched his best throw ever, and Freshman Lucciano Pizarro set what was called "a monster PR!" Finally, in the Vault, Mark Kirby took 3rd!
Among the Distance team, Justin Kelly ran a smart and aggressive race to win the 1600m Run, and Steve Gravlin matched that aggressiveness to take 4th. Both came very close to setting life-time PR's! Mike Zurzolo finished strong in the 800m Run to take 2nd by only .03; and Cam Wilburn set a nice life-time PR in the same race! Finally, in the 3200m Run, Brandon Marks set his own life-time PR and took 3rd!
All of these performances indicated that Cherokee won the championship by 3 points over Paul IV High School and the team went home singing "We are the Champions" (what, you don't remember Queen's 1977 hit?!) but the math majors at the Bennett Center later determined that the team lost to both Kingsway and Highland High Schools! (Keep singing: lyrics and song at: A-Z Lyrics.
Details at: NJ.MileSplit.
Noodling . . .
On January 11, 2016, the South Jersey Track Coaches Association sponsored a special meet at the Bennett Center, the SJTCA Meet # 6 for Novices and a number of Cherokee athletes participated.
Sprint highlights included two very nice 55's from Xavier Wingfield and Will Delendik, and the Hurdlers looked strong and competitive after both Anthony Natale stumbled badly and Tramil Cabbagestalk fell completly: both still got up and finished the race! In addition, the 4 X 400m Relay of Ryan Belz, Kenyon Sprankle, Anthony Natale and James Voynow did well with Ryan Belz running his fastest split of the season; and the 4 X 200m Relay with three freshman and a sophomore -- Michael Coon, Amir Epps, Tra Cabbagestalk and Seb Graterol showed real potential!
In the Field, Colten Schneeweis cleared 8' in the Vault as he continues to learn the event!
Among the Distance performers, in the 4 X 800m Relay, Cherokee got a strong lead-off leg from Junior, Dan Schwartz, setting a new 800m PR; and Jon Conn followed that up with a new 800m PR on the 2nd leg! Congratulations to Matt Morgan who made his track debut, running the 1600m. It was Matt's first track race of any distance, ever!
Our team photographer missed this meet.
Meet details at NJ.MileSplit.
On January 15, 2016, Cherokee sent a number of their top performers to the NJ State Relays GP IV Championships at the Bennett Center and they performed well! In particular, two sprint teams ran their fastest times of the year! The Shuttle Hurdles team of Dave Osterhout, Becker Elbanna, Tra Cabbagestalk and Rico Patterson brought their season best down 1.5 seconds, with the first three running their fastest races of the year! The 4 X 400m Relay of Kevin Milligan, Matt Powell, Terrance Graves and Rico Patterson also ran their best time of the year, with Matt, Rico and Kevin hitting personal best times! In addition, Daulton Hopkins clocked two of his fastest 200m of the season!
Two Distance squads also did well at the meet! The Distance Medley Relay team placed 16th out of 50 teams (3rd in the 2nd heat)! Mike Zurzolo on the 800m leg set a new indoor PR and Justin Kelly on the 1600m leg set an all-time PR and went under 4:40 for the first time ever! The 4 X 800m Relay got good performances from all four runners to finish 17th out of 46 teams (5th in the 2nd heat)! After getting boxed in the first 400m, Mike Zurzolo came on strong over the second 400m to put the team in contention. Nick Falk ran his best race of the winter to date with a strong second leg and a new indoor 800m PR! Cam Wilburn PR'd by 2 seconds on the third leg and Brendan Falzone got out well and held on for a new indoor PR on the anchor!
Two "quirky" things came out of this meet! Brandon Marks, typically seen as a "long distance" runner, anchored the Sprint Medley and set a new 800m PR in the process! Now Coach Shaklee realizes he can easily drop Brandon down into typically sprint events, the 200m, the 400m, maybe even the 100m! GO Brandon! A second "unorthodox" discovery came out of this meet: sprinter Matt Powell was reported (a mistake?) as putting the Shot 29' and this has resulted in a challenge from Coach Kramer (not the Shot Put coach!) to a throw-off at the upcoming Throws Meet on January 28th. GO COACH! At the same time, maybe Powell and Marks can have their own challenge match?! Cool!
Details at: NJ.MileSplit
Noodling again . . .
On January 19, 2016, the South Jersey Track Coaches Association sponsored another special meet at the Bennett Center, the SJTCA Meet # 7 for Novices and a number of Cherokee athletes participated.
The Sprint action on the track began well with the Sprint Medley Relay of Anthony Natale, Bill Delendik, Mike Coon and Mike Algarra taking 3rd place (11 teams) with a series of decent times! In the 55m Dash, Seb Graterol took 8th out of 49 runners and set a new PR; and in the Freshman 55m High Hurdles, Tre Cabbagestalk took 3rd (and 5th overall out of 27 hurdlers) with another decent time! In the 400m Dash, Amir Epps and Kenny Sprankle ran close to their best times of the year as they took 9th and 10th out of 28 runners! Finally, the 4 X 200m Relay team of Coon, Cabbagestalk, Delendik and Graterol took 4th of 11 teams and, with more work on their exchanges, they'll finish well ahead of that in the future!
Among the distance squad, Taha Rana ran a very competitive 1600m race: 16 seconds faster than his best time from last Spring to get 7th; and on the 800m leg of the Sprint Medley Relay, Mike Algarra knocked 9 seconds off of his 800m split at the first winter meet in December, and 2 seconds off his best time from last Spring!
Finally, in the High Jump, Kush Amin cleared a bar for the first time in competition, and Mike McShane improved his technique to set a new PR!
Details available at: NJ.MileSplit.
Jumpers/Vaulters Warming-up
The Action Begins!
