RHS track places top 5 in Wausau indoor meets

Neither the Rhinelander High School girls’ nor boys’ track teams fielded their full rosters late last week as they traveled to Wausau West for a pair of indoor meets. 

The Hodag girls competed Thursday, April 9, coming home fifth out of 13 teams in the Wausau West Girls Indoor. Rhinelander came home fourth the following day when it was the boys’ turn to run in the Wausau West fieldhouse.

“I was honestly surprised when I was putting the roster together and how many were we were leaving home,” Hodag girls’ coach Andy Wyss said. “It was just a little under, a little under half (of the athletes) were staying back. So it was a lot more of a small crew than I thought it was going to be. So at the end of the night, looking at the scores, I thought, ‘Wow, that’s with half our team, we did, we did all right.’ … We did leave some pretty heavy hitters at home. So that, you know, that’s a moral victory, I suppose.”

That was a sentiment echoed by boys’ coach Rod Olson as his team took part in its final scheduled indoor meet of the spring. 

“We mixed some of the veterans with the newcomers — give them some experience, give them a meet. There was quite a few schools. So, getting yourself where you need to be and warming up and everything, it was another good experience for, for our inexperienced runners to and throwers to kind of get through,” he said.

Girls’ meet

Despite the smaller crew, the Hodags still managed eight top-five finishes in the meet, led by a 1-2 sweep by juniors Macy Myers and Emeline Hintz in pole vault. Neither reached their season-best mark — Myers cleared 9 feet, 6 inches and Hintz reached 9-0 — but that was still good enough to claim maximum points in the event. 

“They were pretty disappointed because they were hitting those marks kind of beginning of last year, and they thought they should be higher,” Wyss said. “You can’t win them all, and they did fine. They jumped well. It didn’t translate to feet and inches today.”

Sophomore Mady Treder added a top-three finish, claiming third in the 400 meters (1 minute, 12.73 seconds). 

Freshman Marsadies Williams claimed a pair of top-five finishes for Rhinelander. She placed fourth in the 200 hurdles (34.33) and was fifth in the 55-meter dash (8.21). She was one of three in the top 10 in that event for Rhinelander. Sophomore Ellie Cummings finished eighth (8.33) and freshman Teagan Clark, in her season debut, barely missed the finals, placing 10th (8.39). 

“I realize that the 55-meter dash is kind of a smaller sample size, but I think it gives me a little bit of excitement about maybe some things we could do in individual sprint races or even put together on some of these relays,” Wyss said.

Cummings added a fifth-place finish in the 200. Senior Libbey Buchmann took fourth in the shot put, and freshmen Adeline Olson was fourth in the 3,200.

Boys’ meet

Relays ended up being the top-scoring events for the Hodag boys on Friday. Their lone win came in the sprint medley relay and they added a runner-up finish in the 4x727.25-meter relay.

Rhinelander put some of its top sprinters in the medley as seniors Ben Olson, Evan Shoeder and Cyrus Leisure teamed up with junior Landon Catlin to cross the line in 2:26.23 — 2.77 seconds ahead of runner-up Wausau West.

“That went well. They controlled that race,” coach Olson noted. “We got Evan out again, and Cyrus out again and Ben out again. They haven’t had many meets, but we put them in just a couple of things and then we mixed them in with the younger kids.”

Dean Gillingham, Jonathan Campbell, Wyatt Crowell and Michael Tredupp made up the runner-up quartet in the 4x727.35 (8:40.67), part of a solid night for the Hodag distance crew. Junior Michael Brunette came home third in the 1,600 meters, and sophomore Logan Creapeau was fourth in the 3,200. 

Rhinelander placed two athletes in the pole vault. Paul Denis tied for third in the event while Charlie Antonuk took fifth. Both cleared 10-6, but Denis made it in fewer attempts. 

Shoeder added a fifth-place showing for the Hodags in the high jump. Ben Olson qualified for the finals in the 55 meters, taking eighth while senior Landon Webster made it to the finals in shot put and finished ninth. 

Coach Olson said his squad is dealing with a number of nagging injuries, but is eager to transition into the outdoor portion of the season.

“We’re excited to get out for the meets, but more for the training,” he said. “It’s consistent. Lately we’ve had all the spring sports starting the last two weeks now, you know, and trying to do things in the dome and do things in the gym, it’s been tough. It’s been a little frustrating for training because of the weather and the cancellations …Now we can hit a stretch where it’s just gonna be a predictable week, with manageable temperatures. So I think it’s really going to help us.” 

Hodag Hybrid ahead

Rhinelander hosts its first of four track meets on the season today as the Hodag Hybrid meets takes place on Rhinelander athletic campus. 

As the event name suggests, the meet will have both indoor and outdoor events. The field events will take place inside the Hodag Dome. Running events will be staged outside at Mike Webster Stadium.

“I’m excited (about) what this meet can be in the fact that, rain or shine, we’re hosting these field events and they’re gonna be in the dome,” Wyss said. “You’re gonna get those in no matter what. We’re gonna work on staging, setting everybody up and clerking and doing all that indoors. We’re gonna shuttle people out and do all the running events outside. I think it could be a really neat event because I’ve never really been at a track meet quite like that. If we can pull it off and kind of get comfortable with the format, I think we could do well with it for, for years to come.”

Eleven teams are slated to take part in the meet, which gets underway at 4:15 p.m.

In the interest of full disclosure, the River News notes the author of this story has a family member who is an athlete on the RHS track team.

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].