Lady Gold Sox tryouts today
The Lady Gold Sox 16U travel softball team will hold tryouts for the upcoming season today at Yuba City High’s varsity softball field.
Pitchers and catchers will try out at 11 a.m., and position players will try out at noon.
Players are asked to arrive 20 minutes early for registration. The team is for players born from 20012003.
For more information, call coach Randy Brickford at 521-7544.
Wheatland High senior Erica Grotegeer finished off her legendary prep career in style on Saturday by delivering the best throws of her life on the biggest possible stage.
As a result, she can forever call herself a state champion.
After finishing third in the state last year and taking second in the preliminary round, Grotegeer turned in a dominant performance at 100th CIF State Track & Field Championships at Veterans Memorial Stadium at Buchanan High in Clovis by winning the discus with a career-best throw of 174 feet, 9 inches.
The winning distance came in her fifth throw in the finals and helped her win the event by more than 9 feet over the secondplace competitor. Her fourth throw of 172-2 would have won the state championship as well, and Saturday marked the first time the Grotegeer had topped the 170-foot plateau in her career. And she ended up doing it twice. “I can’t explain it, honestly. I’m just extremely blessed, that’s all I can say,” Grotegeer said. “I was just in the right state of mind and calm all the way through.”
It was the fourth straight year Grotegeer
Photo courtesy of Jay Meder Wheatland High senior Erica Grotegeer stands next to the leaderboard after placing first in the discus at the 100th CIF State Track & Field Championships on Saturday at Veterans Memorial Stadium at Buchanan High in Clovis. Grotegeer won the event with a personal-best throw of 174 feet, 9 inches.
qualified for the CIF state championships and the second time she reached the final day. She crowned Northern Section champion in the discus for the fourth time with a throw of 162-9 last week, and qualified for the finals with a distance of 163-2 in Friday’s preliminary round.
As strong as those throws were, it only set the stage for what she did on Saturday.
“It was just incredible. Across the board, she got better with every throw until her last one.
It was one after another,” Wheatland coach Jason Soderlund said. “She really is a rare athlete. She was so calm and so collected, it was really impressive watching her throw today.”
Grotegeer became the first state champion from Wheatland and the first Northern Section athlete to win the discus title since 1980, when Gridley’s Leslie Deniz won it with a throw of 172-11. Deniz later went on to win a silver medal at the 1984 Olympic Games.