The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
FAIRPORT PROSPERING WITHOUT HOME TRACK
Malkamaki wins two events at NAC meet
Prior to high jump May 10 in the Northeastern Athletic Conference meet at Pymatuning Valley, Fairport coach Scott Hribar laid down a tape measure so Skippers’ high jumpers Madison Hunt and Dimari Payne could put down their step marks for the event.
For Payne, that was going to mean starting his approach in the football field grass at PV.
That’s nothing unusual, of course, for a program in Fairport that has, for decades now, been the longtime News-Herald coverage area standard bearer in the sport when it comes to improvisation.
Much of the Skippers’ track and field reality is rooted in what they don’t have as far as a facility goes and how they make that work.
But the measure of Fairport as a program — one that goes longer than any tape measure — can be found in part in how its student-athletes thrive anyway.
Zane Malkamaki and the Skippers put that premise front and center amid the NAC meet.
Fairport gave a good accounting of itself paced by an individual double from Malkamaki in pole vault and 110-meter hurdles, and the boys were fourth in a nine-team field with 64 points.
In pole vault, the senior, who recently cleared a personal-best 12 feet, 3 inches, hit for a 12-0 on
a new pole to shatter the meet record and win that event going away.
Hribar traversed to Sandusky to get Malkamaki his new pole. Given how recent that trip was, May 10 marked the first time Malkamaki had gotten any real reps on it.
So a clean 12-0 and a decent first attempt at 12-9, as he pursues the school record of 13-4, served as a nice boost heading into the Division III Cuyahoga Heights District next week.
“I think this will really propel me up honestly,” Malkamaki said. “I hadn’t really done any practice on it, maybe one day, which was yesterday. And it’s kind of hard to practice in the gym. But I think once I get a handle of it, honestly I can get the school record pretty easily.
“(Breaking in a new pole
takes) three or four days of practice. But I think if maybe I can accelerate a little bit, I can get comfortable with it fast.”
Malkamaki’s primary work in pole vault, without a track, comes in the Skippers’ gym. Fairport also gets a two-hour window on Sundays to use the track at Riverside, including a vital practice coming up on Mother’s Day — “with the mothers’ approval,” Hribar made sure to note.
The Skippers’ toughness is forged in part by their trackless reality.
“Just a lot of runthroughs and short-distance practice,” Malkamaki said of his usual training work with pole vault without a runway. “We don’t have the full runway, as we would at an actual track. But it’s enough to get me a little pop up in practice.
“I feel like an underdog at almost every meet because I don’t have a track.”
Malkamaki also logged a comfortable 110 hurdles win with a time of 15.8 seconds. PV did not operate with FAT, so the meet was hand-timed. That’s not far off Malkamaki’s season PR of a 15.63 FAT that was sixth in The News-Herald coverage area entering action May 10.
“Yeah, it wasn’t bad,” Malkamaki said of 110s. “I thought I was floating a little bit. With the hurdles, I wasn’t really getting down fast. But it was all right.”
Malkamaki was also slated to participate in 300 hurdles, another strong suit, but elected to forgo it after a lingering neck issue cropped up amid pole vault. He suffered a pair of concussions in football in recent years which led to the neck ailment.
“Usually after pole vault, there’s a lot of pain in my neck and shoulders and stuff,” Malkamaki said.
“I didn’t do 3s today because I wanted to save myself for district and get a good jump in.”
Fairport has had four boys state qualifiers in pole vault all-time, the last coming in 1973.
If Malkamaki’s work to date is indicative, that drought has a fighting chance to end this spring.
These Skippers may be trackless, but their measure goes far beyond that.
“(Getting to state) would be awesome,” Malkamaki said. “I’m really hoping I can.”
Also at NAC, Fairport got a 300 hurdles crown from junior Michael Hess, who went 43.4, an initial clearance that netted Adara Tharp a pole vault title and runners-up in high jump from Hunt, who cleared 4-8 and was close at 4-10, and Payne, who went 5-10 and was fairly close on a first attempt at 6-0.