Serving the High Plains

Lady Longhorns take meet

The Logan girls track team continued its strong early-season showing by winning its 16-team Logan Invitational on Saturday.

The Tucumcari boys team, powered by Seth Martinez's top finishes in two hurdles races and two relays, finished third behind Fort Sumner and Santa Rosa, respectively. San Jon tied for seventh, while athletes from Grady and House also competed.

The Lady Longhorns easily prevailed amid all the girls teams participating on a cold, blustery day with 82 points. Runner-up was Mountainair with 69. Rounding out the rest of the team standings were Clayton 56, Melrose 30.5, Dora 29.5, Fort Sumner 26, Santa Rosa 26, Texico 16, Texline 16, Roy 15, Tucumcari 12, Grady 9, San Jon 6, Maxwell 5 and Clovis Christian 4.

First-place finishers for the Logan girls were Harlie Roach in the discus throw (102 feet, ? inch), Jodi Vance in the 800-meter run (2:41.46), the 1,600-meter relay (4:48.26), 800 relay (2:00.23) and 400 relay (0:56.11).

With a stiff northeast wind and temperatures that barely topped 50 degrees, few coaches were expecting world-class performances Saturday.

"I thought the kids ran hard and performed pretty well, considering the elements they were battling," Logan track coach Robert Young said. "All in all, I liked what I saw. We even improved some of our times in this weather, which is encouraging."

For Tucumcari, Elena Gutierrez was second in the 300-meter hurdles (0:56.62) and Erin Encinias was third in the 800-meter run (2:52.09).

"I didn't have everybody here, so we were a bit relaxed," Tucumcari track coach Wayne Ferguson said. "With the weather, we scratched a few people out of events because of injury stuff. We flip-flopped a couple of kids in open events to see what they could do. We're all right. Hopefully, we'll have some good weather coming up."

For San Jon, Teryn Foote finished second in the 400-meter dash in 1:08.80.

For Grady, Kazne Garrett finished second in the long jump at 13 feet, 1? inches.

In the boys team standings, Fort Sumner edged Santa Rosa 82 to 79.5 in points for the title. Rounding out the rest of the field were Tucumcari 57, Texico 46, Logan 40, Clayton 26.5, Mountainair 25, San Jon 25, Melrose 21, Clovis Christian 12, Roy 12, Floyd 8, Dora 5, House 5, Elida 3 and Grady 2.

For Tucumcari, Martinez prevailed in the 110-meter high hurdles (0:15.68) and 300-meter intermediate hurdles (0:40.79) and anchored the winning 1,600-meter relay (3:39.71) and 400 relay (0:46.33). Gerardo Villa-Vargas also won the 400-meter dash in 0:52.48.

For San Jon, Dustin Bryant won the high jump (6 feet) and long jump (20-6 1/4) and finished second in the triple jump (40-2).

For Logan, the top individual for the boys was Jantzen Paris in the 400-meter dash, finishing second in 0:52.88. The Longhorns won the 800-meter relay in 1:37.61.

House's top boys competitor was Dawson Moon in the 1,600-meter run (fourth, 5:43.78) and 3,200-meter run (fifth, 13:00.65).