Wednesday, April 2, 2003

Healthy Trefz helps City High triumph

By Andy Hamilton
Iowa City Press-Citizen

Junior Nelle Trefz, plagued all of last season by a lingering hamstring injury, broke the Little Hawk Invitational meet record in the 1,500-meter run and anchored City's distance medley relay team to another meet record.

It turned out the Little Hawks needed everything they got from Trefz. The defending state champs, who went through last season undefeated, nearly got a taste of second place at their own meet.

City edged Mount Pleasant by four points - or the difference in Trefz's 800-meter anchor leg against Mount Pleasant 800 state champion Allison Werner.

"I'm pretty happy with what went on tonight," Trefz said. "I think this is a good point to start out the season. Last year I was injured all season and never got any (personal records). I'm really excited to be back on track for my PRs and really nailing some good races."

Trefz's personal-best time of 4 minutes, 42 seconds in the 1,500 appeared in jeopardy in the outdoor season opener. She finished in 4:45.09, shaving 11 seconds off the meet record she set as a freshman.

A year ago, however, was a different story.

Trefz pulled her left hamstring in the district cross country meet as a sophomore. She ran with the injury at the state meet. In hindsight, Trefz said she probably shouldn't have run at state. She spent the rest of her sophomore year trying to regain the shape she lost from missing training time while the injury healed.

"It really gave me appreciation for running," Trefz said. "I really recognized how much I truly love running. I kind of took it for granted. When I couldn't run all winter, I really missed it."

Trefz tracked down Werner to help the distance medley team of Kerry Kamber, Megan Hichwa and Laura Struve break the distance medley meet record in 4:19.44 - four hundredths of a second faster than Mount Pleasant.

Werner came out on top in another photo finish, edging City's Meggan Reed by one hundredth of a second in the first outdoor meeting between the two since Werner edged Reed at the state meet last year.

"It's just the beginning of the season," Reed said. "There's still a long way to go. I know both of us will be dropping our times throughout the season. Hopefully we'll be able to stay close throughout the season and keep pushing each other, and battle it out at state.

"This is just the Little Hawk Invitational. There's so much more to come in this season. It's just the first meet. I'm setting my expectations high."

City's Jessica Elliott set a new meet record in the discus with a toss of 127 feet, 8 inches. The other Little Hawk event winner was Katie Krei, who edged teammate Monica Mims in the 400.

City needed every point it got without sprinter Camille Jordan and distance standout Jennie Funk. Jordan was ill Tuesday, while Funk is expected to miss the first month of the outdoor season with a stress fracture in her leg.

"Being down your No. 1 sprinter and your No. 1 or 2 distance runner, you can't just walk through a meet like this," City coach Terry Coleman said. "Overall, some pretty good things happened. But it keeps it real that there are some talented teams out there and you've got to be on your game if you're going to win."

Team scores - 1. City High 147; 2. Mount Pleasant 143; 3. Bettendorf 51; 4. Cedar Rapids Xavier 51; 5. Burlington 451/2; 6. Urbandale 29; 7. Davenport Central 22; 8. Muscatine 17.

Individual winners, City place-winners

3,000 - 1. Beth Whalen (Bett.) 10:57.48; 2. Emily Funk (C) 11:38.31; 4. Ruhee Arora (C) 11:48.53.

4x800 - 1. Xavier (Sara Clancy, Sarah A'hearn, Megan Glover, Erin Penticoff) 9:55.57; 4. City (Lindsey Diggleman, Drew Foreman, Sara Dietz, Aly Boyd) 10:37.55.

Shuttle hurdle relay - 1. Mount Pleasant (Cherie Nichting, Rachel Hutchinson, Anne Graber, Haley Sinn) 1:07.16; 2. City (Tara Whiting, Annie Fraga, Aly Roelf, Maya Monitto-Webber) 1:07.77.

Distance medley relay - 1. City High (Kerry Kamber, Megan Hichwa, Laura Struve, Nelle Trefz) 4:19.44.

Discus - 1. Jessica Elliott (C) 127-8; 4. Corrie Wagner (C) 102-0.

Long jump - 1. Danielle Hutchinson (MP) 16-6; 2. Emily Triplett (C) 15-10.

Shot put - 1. Angel Anderson (DC) 38-51/4; 2. Elliott (C) 38-0; 3. Wagner (C) 35-61/2.

High jump - 1. (tie) Lindsay Scott (MP), Lindsey Boldt (MP) 5-2.

100 - 1. Shannon Burge (Bett.) 12.93; 4. Emily Hesseltine (C) 13.62.

400 - 1. Katie Krei (C) 1:01.51; 2. Monica Mims (C) 1:02.31.

4x200 - 1. Mount Pleasant (D. Hutchinson, Scott, Boldt, Mallory Henderson) 1:48.19; 2. City (Ashton Strickland, Patrice Jones, Kelly Sherry, Virginia Dreier) 1:49.9

100 hurdles - 1. Jenna Caffrey (Bur.) 15.14; 2. Monitto-Webber (C) 16.15.

800 - 1. Allison Werner (MP) 2:20.28; 2. Meggan Reed (C) 2:20.29; 4. Maggie Leyendecker (C) 2:23.08.

200 - 1. Henderson (MP) 27.50; 2. Dreier (C) 27.75.

400 hurdles - 1. Caffrey (Bur.) 1:07.93; 3. Kelly Sherry (C) 1:10.36; 5. Laura Krumm (C) 1:13.20.

Sprint medley relay - 1. Xavier 1:55.45; 2. City (Whiting, Triplett, Strickland, Mims) 1:55.47.

1,500 - 1. Trefz (C) 4:45.09; 4. Reed (C) 5:02.89.

4x100 - 1. Mount Pleasant (Henderson, Scott, D. Hutchinson, Sinn) 51.75; 2. City (Triplett, Tutson, Dreier, Monitto-Webber) 52.04.

4x400 - 1. Mount Pleasant (Emily Petrzelka, Steph Fedler, Boldt, Werner) 4:10.87; 2. City (Full, Krista Wiegert, Krei, Mims) 4:16.51.

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