Titans crush Orange Belt competition

Granite Hills, Cesar Chavez and a third squad — Strathmore — crossed paths in Wednesday evening’s triangular meet.

The small school from up north hadn’t fielded a track team since 2003 because it drew athletes away from its baseball team. Now that the program has been revived with the Spartans’ football coach Jeromy Blackwell pulling double duty and leading the way, Strathmore was a late addition just before the season started.

“We invited them to all of our home meets because in their league, only Woodlake and Corcoran have track,” Granite coach Chris Ross said. “This way they can compete more often.”

While the Spartans and Grizzlies got plenty of burn time, it was Chavez who burned them both and ran away with the win.

Chavez swept most of the long-distance races including first places in the 1600-, 3200-meter runs. The Titans also claimed all top three spots in each of the boys’ and girls’ 400-meter dashes — a feat Ross attributed to the school’s strong pedigree of runners.

“They’ve got a core of long-distance kids that are just outstanding,” Ross said of Chavez. “Their brothers raced, their parents raced. They’ve got a fine tradition of running.”

It also helped the Delano-based school’s enrollment is nearly twice the size of Granite or Strathmore’s.

Notwithstanding, the Grizzlies held their own — particularly in the short races.

Granite’s D.J. Lewis shined brightest by taking first in the anticipated 100-meter dash, where he edged the second-best time by a tenth of a second at 11.7 seconds. Lewis also took first in the long jump with a distance of 17 feet, 7 inches and snagged second place in the 200-meter dash with a time of 24.4 seconds.

Not bad for a kid who was in a motorcycle accident last week.

“D.J. winning the 100 was a little bit of a surprise,” Ross said. “He banged up his legs in that accident and yet he still raced.”

Tommy Brumfield notched another victory for Granite in the 800-meter run at 2:12.0 and Julian Espino took first in the 110-meter hurdles, clocking in at 17.9 while teammate Sammy Salinas was second at 20.2 seconds.

“Sammy was also kind of a surprise for us,” Ross said. “Last week, he was playing golf and he decided he wanted to come back and race track. I think he missed the competition and the atmosphere. For him to finish that high was impressive.”

Strathmore’s top performer was a transplant from the Spartans’ vaunted soccer squad — Amelia Medrano. The junior finished third in both the 200-meter dash (30.3 seconds) and the 100-meter dash (14.1 seconds).

A pair of giant Grizzlies — gridiron lineman Alex Esparza and heavyweight wrestler Israel Roman — easily took first in their chosen events. Esparza launched the discus 114.3 feet while Roman hurled the shot put 40 feet, 11 inches. 

Roman’s teammate Paul Sim took second in the shot put with a throw of 40 feet, 2 inches.

At the end of the nearly four-hour affair, Granite almost upset the Titans in the 4x100 relay, gaining the lead in the second leg before relinquishing it in the third and lost by seven-tenths of a second (Granite finished the relay in 46.8 seconds to the Titans’ 46.1).

“I like to put the fastest guy in the second exchange,” Ross said. “I’m kind of old school that way because you can make that one 120 meters instead of a hundred. It’s been my philosophy but it doesn’t always work.

“But I was real pleased with our kids today,” he continued. “We don’t have that many kids, but they’re just fun to be around and they’re willing to work hard. This has been a really fun season for me so far.”

Chavez’s girls took first in the long jump, triple jump and shot put while its boys took first in the triple jump.