Track and Field: A-B-E girls break school record in 4x200m relay, earn fourth overall; boys place sixth

WAHPETON, NORTH DAKOTA - With eight top-three finishes and three first-place finishes, the Ashby-Brandon-Evansville girls track and field team earned fourth out of 10 programs in a meet on Monday in Wahpeton, North Dakota.

Lucea Wales, Skylar Bitzan, EmmaLee Brethorst and Catherine Koefod broke the school record in the 4x200m relay with a time of 1:52.89. For Wales, this was one of three first-place finishes.

Wales earned first place in the 300m hurdles with a time of 48.12, a personal record for her. She also had a first-place finish and a personal record in the long jump (16’9).

Bitzan finished second in the 200m with a personal record of 28.05 and third in the 100m with a personal record of 13.72.

Koefod broke her personal record in the 400m with a time of 1:07.56, which earned her third place.

A-B-E finished second in the 4x800m relay, with Ashley Paulsen, Courtney Brethorst, Natalie Gutierrez and Hope Rovang running a time of 11:59.00.

Katrina Buccholz finished second in the discus throw with a personal record of 88’11.

As a team, the girls finished with 84 points. The meet winner, Wahpeton, finished with 143.17.

The A-B-E boys and girls had a combined 29 personal records broken on Monday.

“The great thing is that these PR's are not just happening in only a few events or for only a few particular athletes,” head coach Zach Traphagen said. “We're getting massive improvements in the throws, the jumps, sprints and distance events. Hopefully, we continue to maintain our focus on continuing to improve and not allow ourselves to be satisfied.”

Like the girls team, the A-B-E boys team had a handful of top-three finishes.

A-B-E had runner-up finishes from Dierk Goeden in the pole vault event and in the 4x800m relay by Kenneth Spielman, Kaleb Burkey-Reque, Ben Myron and Cohen Reiland.

Goeden cleared 9 feet on the pole vault, while Spielman, Burkey-Reque, Myron and Reiland ran a time of 10:46.05. Logan Froemming finished third on the pole vault (8’6).

Kian Geckle and Logan Haburn also had third place finishes for A-B-E. Geckle finished third in the high jump (5’6) and Haburn finished third in the 100m with a personal record of 11.86.

The A-B-E boys team scored 57.5 team points and finished sixth in the meet. Wahpeton won the meet and posted a score of 171, 60 more points than runner up Fargo North.

A-B-E is scheduled to compete at the Pheasant Conference meet on Thursday at 10 a.m. in Wheaton.