By Leonard COUTIN

The Burroughs Indians hosted the Pacific League tri meet on Memorial Field on April 9 facing the CV Falcons and the Muir Mustangs. Despite temperatures in the 80s, the athletes battled hard and many were rewarded with personal best performances.

The Indians boys’ varsity won the 400m relay with a time of 44.08. The Falcons’ time was 46.31.

The Crescenta Valley girls beat Burroughs with a time of 55.88, but the best time of the day came from the Muir varsity girls (49.55).

Falcon Gabe Collison captured the only dual win of the day, winning the 1600m (4:23) and 3200m (9:27). Nick Beatty won the 800m with a time of 1:59 and ran a strong leg in the 1600m relay.

Matt Manalo posted one of the fastest anchor legs in the 1600m relays this year (51.3). Falcon Juho Kim had a personal best in the high jump (5-10), but placed second behind Burroughs’ Matt Schwartz who hit the same height but with fewer misses. Schwartz also had a record win in the pole vault of 15-0, which is the second best jump at Burroughs and qualifies him as one of California’s best. Burroughs has high hopes of seeing him make the CIF finals and to also participate in the state meet this year.

CV’s Ben Rees and Davo Hakobyan won their field events: Rees in the discus throw (120-1) and Hakobyan in the shot put of (39-5).

The Mustangs unfortunately brought a very small team this year – a sad reflection when considering how strong the Muir track and field teams were in the 1960s through the ’80s.

Final scores in boys’ varsity were CV 51 vs. JB 85; CV 111 vs. Muir 23.

The Falcon girls had an extraordinary day on the track against their rivals. Winning 12 out of 16 events, they scored an all time best against the competition. Megan Melnyk and teammates Erika Johnson and Rebecca Mencia swept the top three places in both the 1600m and the 800m races: Melnyk running 5:31, Johnson 5:32 and Mencia 5:37. Melnyk ran 2:24 in the 800m, followed by senior Johnson (2:26) and Mencia (5:37).

Falcon Courtney Iannello won the 400m with a time of (1:02.15). Emmy Walker jumped 5-2 to win the high jump. Haley Witzeman won the 3200m with a time of 11:32. Grace Keller won the 300h (49.4). Alisa Shin placed second in discus with a throw of 83-0.

Claire Schlueter placed second in the triple jump (29-3) and third in the long jump (14-6).

Coach Evans made his assessment at the end of the meet.

“It was a very good, competitive meet,” he said. “Lot of PRs. Field events are getting better with every meet. [I’m] proud of how we competed.  We are getting a little better each week.”

Final score girls’ varsity CV 89 vs. JB 47; CV 85 vs. Muir 32.

Coach Evans congratulated his frosh/soph teams for performing well, too. CV won both the boys and girls events against both schools. Final score was FS boys’ CV 58 vs. JB 78; CV 122 vs. Muir 0.

The FS girls’ CV 97 vs. JB 37; CV 124 vs. Muir 1.

  Leonard Coutin