State Track Meet
Olivia Pielemeier helped Lake Hamilton significantly at the Class 5A state track meet at Hot Springs’ Joe C. Reese Stadium Thursday.
The sophomore distance runner contributed a total of 30 points toward the Lady Wolves’
56 points on the day with individual wins in the 1600- and
800-meter runs and as the anchor of the 4x800-meter relay. Despite the two individual wins, Pielemeier was more excited about helping her relay team consisting of Maylin Reyes, Avery Hunt and Blair Turpen in the first three legs.
“Team-wise, it was amazing, and that’s really what we wanted to do,” she said. “The standout for me today was the
4x800. We went into it being up in the top few, but the team atmosphere that we had on that and all the the energy from all the teammates, and it was really, really amazing.”
Pielemeier said that she picked up a new personal record in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:20.47, but she never assumes that she has everything under control.
“In my mind, I try to remind myself that’s not over till it’s over,” she said. “I mean, patience is the key in racing. That’s one thing that I figured out — trust the process. … It’s a fun process, and even speaking on having it under control, or whatever, I mean, if we stay healthy, and I’m excited to see what our team future looks like, and it’s going to be really, really amazing.”
The Lady Rams 4x800-meter relay team finished in 9:56.58 with Mountain Home coming in second with a time of 9:58.31. Pielemeier’s 1600-meter finish was in 5:13.90, roughly 5 seconds slower than her season best finish.
Lakeside junior Dylan Dew picked up his first win in a state meet in the 1600-meter run, crossing the finish line in 4:24.94 with a flourish.
“In all honesty, I didn’t think I was gonna win,” he said. “I was just trying to come out here for placement. … I was pacing the first two laps, came right into the third off, that was my goal. Shoot that 100 trying to get a break off from them. And I was like, ‘OK, I’ve got like, 600 meters to go, I’ve worked this hard, I’m not gonna lose it now. Just that last 200 felt like a blur to me. I came to the finish line just super happy.”
In the last 10 meters of the race, Dew took a look back and stretched his arms wide to celebrate the win.
“As I was coming down the
100, I was like, ‘OK, these guys I’m racing, they can, they can sprint fast,’” he said. “So I was like, ‘I’ve gotta sprint this last
100,’ and then once I saw that final 10 meters, I gave a look — a good look back. I was like, ‘They aren’t catching me.’ I was just super happy. Words can’t describe it.”
Hot Springs will also have at least one representative at the Meet of Champions after Tyrell Lambert won the triple jump with a distance of 46 feet,
3 inches. Jonesboro’s Erik Wilson finished second with a leap of 44-10.
“Actually, I feel great,” Lambert said. You know, my coach told me to come out here and compete. I won it all.”
Vilonia won the girls side of the meet with 87 points with Jonesboro (73) and Texarkana
(72) rounding out the top three. Lake Hamilton finished sixth, and Lakeside was 14th.
“This is huge,” said Vilonia head coach John Steward of his team winning its first state title in track. “It’s been a long time coming. We’ve been bridesmaids for a ton of times. These kids have knocked it out the park. It’s unbelievable. Seniors came in, and they wanted to, they wanted to have a great season like any team does, but there’s just something special about this bunch that they were not going to be denied.”
Texarkana won the boys meet with 111 points with Vilonia taking second with 97.5 and Lake Hamilton third (66). Lakeside finished 13th, and Hot Springs was 17th.
“I’ll tell you this is a big one,” said Texarkana head coach Jeff Harrell. “You know, winning the conference championship was really big, but this is the one, you know, of course, everybody wanted. And it’s a hard day with prelims in the same day. And it’s a really grind, and I’m just really proud of our kids and how they fought through because there were times early, it didn’t look real good. And then we kind of bounced back, and we had a kid Polly Green that won the long jump in that second phase of the field events, and … the kids started thinking they could do it.”
Pielemeier is excited to be competing at the Meet of Champions on May 15 at Harding University.
“For sure (we’re) gonna do the 4x800 because that’s something that obviously, our team wants to do,” Pielemeier said. “Individual wise, I’m not 100% sure yet. We’ll see though.
“I’m excited. I’m excited to race against those 6A girls and being able to push really good.”
Dew is not going into next week’s Meet of Champions with the assumption that he will win, but he aims to compete.
“There’s definitely fast people, so I’m looking to come to compete,” he said. “I know those 6A kids are really, really fast. So I’ll try and stay with them as long as possible.”
Lambert has high aspirations for his final competition of the year.
“I feel great,” Lambert said. “I’m going to go there and win it, too.”