Littleton – The fastest runs of the day at the Liberty Bell boys track and field meet came when it was called off and the remaining participants sprinted for the exits.
It was hard to blame the athletes for the mad dash as snow blew sideways and temperatures dropped into the low 30s on Saturday at Littleton Public Schools Stadium.
“We tried to fire up and get ahead on everything as much as we could. We knew this weather was coming and we were up against the clock,” said Kevin Young, the boys track and field coach at meet host Heritage. “If we would have had the hurdles out for the 300 before the snow started, we probably could have finished the meet. But I didn’t want the kids going over any barriers in this type of weather.”
The meet, which was called with five events remaining, featured 41 schools from two states and provided one of the last opportunities to qualify for state.
Based on school enrollment, the meet was split into two classes, with Heritage taking first place in Class I and Montbello winning Class II.
By the end of the day, runners hugged themselves and shivered in their starting blocks, but Littleton’s Shane Cronin didn’t seem to mind too much.
“Aside from my extremities I felt pretty good, actually,” said Cronin, who won the Class II 400-meter run.
“It was a little hard to keep the intensity level up because it was kind of a distraction out there. But I just tried to run hard, go through it and ignore it.”
As could be expected, no records were broken and times were a bit off pace, but George Washington’s Darius Reed clocked a wind-aided time of 14.09 seconds in the 110 hurdles.
Montbello continued to show off its speed with another sub-42-second time in the 400 relay. The Warriors want to break 41 seconds, which would put them on the national level.
