Dalton State women’s track team finishes third at SSAC Championships

The Dalton State Lady Roadrunners travelled to Hattiesburg, Miss., home of William Carey University, to compete in the Southern States Athletic Conference Championship meet and every athlete on the Dalton State roster scored points for the team in the two-day meet.

On Day 1, the Lady Birds were led by individual conference champions, freshman Riley Jo Ford (10,000 Meter Run), freshman Briana Ray (Pole Vault), sophomore Haley Tillery (3,000 Meter Steeplechase), sophomore Kathryn Vradenburgh (1500 Meter Run), and junior Alex Gass (5,000 Meter Run).

The team scored their highest point total in school history posting 123.5 points. That beat the old mark of 99 points set in 2018. Those points were good enough to carry them to a thirdplace finish as a team, also a school best.

The Roadrunners competed in several field events and two running events on Friday. The first event of the day was the high jump. No one had ever completed a height in the high jump for Dalton State.

First up was Vradenburgh, middle distance runner turned high jumper for a few minutes. She was the first to clear a height. Not to be outdone, Vanessa Rivera cleared the opening height and then two more to set the school record at 1.45 meters. It was good enough for seventh place for Vanessa. Kathryn finished 10th overall.

Then it was onto the 4X800 meter relay where Vradenburgh Kathryn was joined by teammates, freshman and Ringgold native Kayla Mattox, junior Rebecca Poe, and sophomore Kate Roberts. The team was seeded fourth, but they outperformed their seed time by a whopping 35 seconds to finish third and set a new school record by finishing in ten minutes flat. It was the first podium finish of the meet for the Roadrunners, but there would be many more to come.

Freshman Suzana Rivera took to the discus circle and finished one place higher than her seed had predicted. It was good enough to give her an eighth place finish and add a point to the team total.

Then came the 10,000 meter run. The team of Ford, Gass, and senior Kay Vradenburgh swept the podium with a 1,2,3 finish in the event. It was Riley Jo’s second conference championship of her career, having won the cross-country championship in the fall.

The first event for the ladies on Day 2 was the pole vault, an event no former Roadrunner had ever attempted. Ray set a personal-best with a vault of 2.57 meters. It wasn’t a conference record, but it was the best conference performance in several years.

The first running event of the day was the 3,000 meter Steeplechase, an event where participants jump over 35 barriers while running nearly two miles. One of those barriers includes a pit of water on the other side.

The Roadrunners sent three athletes to the starting line and were led by Tillery who won the event and just missed the conference record by seven-hundredths of a second. She was followed by a thirdplace finish from Poe, who had finished fourth in the event two years ago. Rachel Ward had her best race of the year and finished sixth overall in her first-ever try at the event.

Running the 4X100 at the conference championship for the first time in school history, the team of Vanessa Rivera, Ray, Poe and Mattox lowered their own school record and finished in fourth place overall, just edged off the podium by a couple of seconds.

Kathryn Vradenburgh would be the star of the next running event for the Roadrunners. Running as the No. 2 seed, she ran away from the field and set a new conference record for the 1500. Her finishing time of 4:49 is the best in Dalton State history. She was followed by a third-place finish from Ford, as well as a fifth-place finish from Roberts. It was Roberts’ personal-best and Mattox also set a personal-best in the event.

Kathryn Vradenburgh, Roberts, Mattox and Tillery raced in the 800. Vradenburgh and Roberts both ran personal-bests to finish third and fourth overall, respectively. Vradenburgh’s times was good enough to slightly lower her own school record. Tillery and Roberts finished first and third in their heat and ended up ninth and 12th overall.

The heat of the day is no time to run the 5,000 meters, but that’s just what they did next. The Roadrunners would send the podium-sweeping team from the previous night’s 10K to the line with a tough field to battle.

Just before the halfway mark of the race, Gass, the Heritage High School alum, took control and ran away from the field to finish in a time of 19:15, which was very fast under the hot conditions. Ford battled back and forth with Isabel Valenzuela from Mobile, but came out on top to finish second. Kay Vradenburgh battled a little farther back to finish in exactly the place her entry time predicted she would finish — sixth — good enough for three more points.

The day finished as all track meets do with the 4X400. The team of Poe, Tillery, Roberts and Kathryn Vradenburgh finished fourth and missed the school record by just one second.

Ford scored a total of 24 points in the meet, eclipsing the 22.5 points Roadrunner great, Nayeli Jacobo, scored in 2018.

“I was really proud of the ladies’ effort at this meet,” said head coach Dean Thompson. “They came out with a chance to finish in the top three and they did it. It was a true team effort. Every person on the team scored at least one point.

“As a coach, this is the kind of group you want to have. Sure, they’re talented, but they have such great character too and they get along well and have fun. At the end of the day, as hard as they work, both in school and on the track, they’re just good young women who care about each other and the people around them. They’re special and I’m really proud of them!”