With the completion of the 2013-2014 Track & Field season, it is now time to reflect on the accomplishments of our athletes.

Our Varsity Points Leaders for the year were as follows –

• Soph- Bailey Herfurth – 46.5 points (2 podium finishes)

• Jr- Rob Russell – 64.83 points (5 podium finishes, including 3 Wins!)

• and your 2014 Points leader –
  Sr- Anthony Parameswaran – 128.5 points! (15 podium finishes, including 3 wins and a 6th place at State!) Anthony’s point total even beat last year’s remarkable score of 126 points set by then Sr- Ben Dailey.

The competition for Girls Varsity Points Leaders was a tight one!

• Jr- Kai Perkins  – 55 points (6 podium finishes, including 3 wins and a 6th place at State!)

• Frsh- Gabrielle Griner – 61 points (7 podium finishes, including her FIRST varsity win!)

• and your 2014 Points leader –
  Jr- Kelsey Johnson – 68.25 points (4 podium finishes, including 1 win!)

Worth mentioning is 8th grader Lauryn Hall. Lauryn is our 4th place, Varsity girls points scorer. She scored 23 points in just two varsity meets! Expect to see her battling for top of the list next year.

MOST IMPROVED

This year’s JV Awards for “Most Improved” went to –

Frsh- Glenda Booker & Milan Wall

This was Glenda’s first year to go out for track and she quickly found her niche in the Discus and the Shot. She took 4th in the Shot at the JV Championships with a PR of 27-9 and took 7th in the Discus with a throw of 62-7.5. Glenda also competed for our Varsity squad getting a PR throw of 78-9 in the Discus which claimed a 7th place for her and earned her first Varsity points.

Milan was also new to track but shows great promise in the sprints.
He took 5th in the 200m Dash at the JV Championships and even scored his first Varsity points as part of an SHS SCHOOL RECORD setting 4x400m relay team! He has a PR of 24.96 in the 200m and a PR of 56.56 in the 400m.

This year’s Varsity Awards for “Most Improved” went to –

Jr- Kai Perkins  & Soph- Will Kieser

This is Kai ‘s third year on our throwing squad. She throws shot but really excelled in the Discus this year. She improved last year’s PR by 6 feet in the Discus and finished in the points in every single meet she competed in !  Of her 8 competitions, she finished on the podium 6 times and 3 of those were for wins! She qualified for State and had a points scoring finish of 6th there.

Will is another one of our throws team. His second year on the squad, he throws Discus, Shot and new for this year – Javelin.  In the Discus he improved last year’s PR by over 16 feet with a throw of 96-7 which scored him an 8th place and earned him his first Varsity points!  In the Javelin he threw a season’s best of 108′-9″ earning him his best finish of 11th place.

Athlete Scholars

This years top athlete scholars were 8th- Savannah Wilson & Soph- Luke Kollman

8th grader Savannah Wilson has been mostly a distance runner for our Cross Country Team these last two years but has applied her abilities to the 1600m for Track Season. Her season best was a 7:02.09 at the JV Championships. She currently holds a 98% academic average!

This is Luke Kollman’s first year in Track & Field. He has PRs of 3:05.16 in the 800m and 6:34.52 in the 1600m. More impressively, he holds an Academic 4.52 GPA !

Coaches Trophy

This honor goes out tho the Athlete who excelled not just at meets but everyday at practices, both in their own efforts and in encouragement to their team mates. This years recipient is 7th grader Elizah Vargas.

Elizah has tried his hand at several distances. In the JV Championships he placed 9th in the 400m, 8th in the 800m, and 6th in the 1600m. He even ran the 3200m at this years State qualifier Varsity meet, setting a PR time of 11:45.90

MVP Awards

The MVP Awards in JV went to 9th graders Gabrielle Griner & Daryl Bowden.

This is Gabrielle’s third season on the Sparkman Team.  She is the three time North Alabama JV Champion in the girls PoleVault and in three years of JV competition, has never lost a meet. She has competed for both the Varsity and JV squads since the 7th grade and has qualified for the State Varsity Track meet all three years. She was second highest girls varsity points scorer and had 7 Varsity podium finishes this year with 1 Varsity WIN. She currently holds the SHS School Record in the Girls Pole Vault at 10′.

This is Daryl’s second season with the Track Team. While he has run in the 110 hurdles and the 400m dash, this season he seems to be finding his niche in the jumps.  At this years JV Championships Daryl placed 5th in the High Jump and 1st PLACE in the Long Jump! He also competed for our Varsity Squad and holds the team’s best mark this year in the Long Jump and tied with Jake Russell for season’s best in the High Jump. This year in Varsity he has placed as high as 16th in the High Jump, 12th in the Long Jump and 21st in the Triple Jump.

The MVP Awards in Varsity went to Jr- Kelsey Johnson & Sr- Anthony Parameswaran.

Kelsey started on the Cross Country Team in 2012 and added Track & Field to her repertoire in 2013. She has competed in 11 different events AND the State Heptathlon! She was this years Varsity Girls high points scorer and had 4 podium finishes including 1 WIN. She had a season high 3rd in the Triple Jump, 7th in the 300m Hurdles, and a WIN in the 100m Hurdles. Though excelling in multiple events, the 100m Hurdles have been her forte’. This year she finished in the points in that event during EVERY regular season meet and for the 2nd year in a row, QUALIFIED for the State  Track meet in that event. Kelsey owns the SHS SCHOOL RECORD in the Triple Jump (31′-7″), the 100m Hurdles(16.93), the 60m Hurdles(10.47), the Three Mile run (22:42.60) and the Heptathlon (2747 points)

Anthony could have an entire page dedicated to his Track exploits. While he does run the relatively short, 800m – he is mostly a distance runner (1600m, 3200m, 5000m) . However what he does, he does with distinction! In the 1600m this year he ran 8 regular season races finishing with a 5th, five 2nds and two 1sts! He qualified for State in that race and place just outside the points, in 9th, while setting a new SHS SCHOOL RECORD.
In the 3200m race, Anthony competed 7 times, finishing with two 3rds, four 2nds and a WIN! He also qualified for STATE where he finished with a points scoring 6th place, also setting a new SHS SCHOOL RECORD.
Not to totally overlook his efforts in the 800m. He had a 3rd place finish in that race this year and an 8th at the Section Qualifying meet.
Anthony is the current SHS SCHOOL RECORD holder in the 1600m (4:30.65), 3200m(9:54.41), Three Mile(17:24.60) and 5000m(16:15.03).

Anthony has received Academic & Athletic Scholarships to UAH. We will certainly miss him next year … and miss trying to pronounce his last name 😉