The Patriot girls’ sprint relays have had success in most of their meets all season, but none bigger than the one Saturday afternoon at Howard Wood Field where 100 teams from five different states compete in Sioux Falls.
After coming up just inches short in the 4-by-200 meter-relay Friday afternoon, the team of Abbie Harris, Brynn Rauk, Layla Deelstra and Brynn Bakken were not going to be denied the chance to stand up on the podium in front of the 1,000-plus fans at Howard Wood Field again.
Strong runs by the first three runners left the Patriots just barely in second place as the anchor runners got the hand-off. Bakken, just a seventh-grader at H-BC, finished the race in first place for the Patriots as she has all year long.
She pulled ahead of the Colman-Egan runner just before the finish line to send the team up to the podium to pose with their first-place trophy in front of their excited fans.
The Patriots ran a season best in the race with a time of 52.53. Their next goal is to go after the school 4-by-100-meter relay record of 51.62 set back in 2019, a team Deelstra was also a part of.
The girls’ 4-by-200 mentioned before came in second place on Friday afternoon with a time of 1:50.80, just 0.17 seconds before the first place team.
Bakken also ran the open 100-meter dash Friday afternoon, placing 13th out of more than 50 runners with a season best 12.72.
The boys’ teams also ran in the 4-by-100 and 4-by-200-meter relays. The 4-by-200 team of Ty Bundesen, Liam Raymon, Eli Taubert and Cooper Gehrke finished in 13th place with a time of 1:37.72 while the 4-by-100 team of Bundesen, Raymon, Luke Fuerstenberg, and Arends placed 16th (47.14).