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Track Season Underway

Track Season Underway

By Taylor Berns

With the 2014 winter sports season winding up, the girls and boys track seasons are underway. The girls’ team was introduced to a new but not unfamiliar coach, Paul Iekel, this year after Carrie (BreDahl) Clemsen resigned after one year of coaching. The boys’ team will also be introduced to a new head coach, Alan Jenkins, who is a first-year teacher at Atlantic Middle School and head boys basketball coach. Jenkins transferred from Abraham Lincoln High School where he was also head track coach.

Iekel and Jenkins both have goals for the 2014 season that they would like to accomplish. Jenkins said, “My main goal is to have each kid show progress throughout the year. We want to become stronger, faster runners that way when they step on the track they are laying it all on the line with their best effort.”

Since this will be Jenkins’ first year as a coach, he doesn’t know where the boys stand individually or what the strengths of the team are.

Iekel said, “I’ve shared several event goals with the team but the biggest thing I hope to see is that I want the girls to gel as a team and learn to really support each other to be better than they were before the season began.”

Athletes also have goals they would like to accomplish in the 2014 season. Junior Brody Peterson said, “I want more wins as a team and he [Jenkins] will develop our team and bring us together as a team.”

Sophomore Darien Mills said, “I want to go to state as a team and place in every meet.”

About 36 boys are out for track this year, almost double the number from last year. Jenkins said, “The number-one key element to any track team is to have depth, to have good number of kids out for track. Track is one of those sports where there is no where to hide and no finger that can be pointed when things don’t go well. It is really a put-up or shut-up kind of sport. If we become tough both mentally and physically, I like our chances of having success.”

Iekel said that returning state qualifier sophomore Tiffany Williams stands out to him in terms of a successful season. Field events are an area where Iekel would like to see the most improvement. “I’d like to see our throwers make a big jump this season, and have a few that can consistently throw the shot over 30 feet and the discus over 100 feet,” Iekel said.

The girls traveled to Central College in Pella, Iowa, for their first competition on March 22. The boys met the following day, March 23, also at Central College.

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