On Friday, Mar. 16, the York Boys Track Team competed in the varsity and sophomore level conference meets. The varsity team took sixth and the sophomore team won the conference title, so overall it was a great night for the Dukes.

“I can’t even comment on how many great performances there were during the last two days,” head coach Charlie Kern said. “The meet was such a magical time with forever moment after forever moment for me and so many kids on the team.”

The Duke’s success on Friday can be attributed to the many great performances that occurred in the meet. On the sophomore side, athletes continuously placed exceptionally well with many first and second places.

Starting with field events, in the long jump freshman Robert Harden took first and sophomore Richard Buehling took second, starting off the meet with 18 points. In the shot put, sophomores Jack Wall and Keywone Reed took first and second place, once again raising the team’s points. Sophomore Kameron Stearns won the triple jump, and sophomore Alex Baker took eighth in pole vaulting.

“We saw some really good things on the jump side of things,” said Ben Sharko, head jump coach. “We saw guys go out and compete really well. In the past two weeks, we saw some new guys come out to jump and they helped the team score points early on in the meet.”

The sophomores continued to show their power in the sprints. Sophomore Jimmy Hoffman won both the 55-meter dash and the 200-meter dash, single-handedly pulling a total of 20 points. Sophomore Max Santiago took third in 55 meter high hurdles, and sophomore Kevin Lawrence took sixth in the 55-meter low hurdles. Sophomore Eric Sylvester took third in the 400-meter dash, and sophomores Matt Gawlik, Jimmy Hoffman, Ian Williams, and Max Santiago took first in the 800-meter relay.

“I was really happy with the performances at the varsity conference and the freshmen and sophomore conferences,” said Reed Sundberg, head spring coach. “As a sprint crew, we’re just going to keep getting better.”

Then the team dominated in the distance events. Sophomore Brian Pratt and freshman Sam Ayers took first and second in the two-mile, and Ayers with a time of 10:05.5 is currently the fastest freshman in the two-mile in the state. The team placed second in the two-mile relay, then Pratt came back to run the mile and placed third while freshman Colin Hill won the mile. Daniel Klysh ran and won the 600-meter run, and finally, in the mile relay, the team placed fifth.

“It was awesome to watch kids make the conscious decision to find out how good they can be,” Kern said. “Many achieved that–not everybody did, but the valiant effort that was put forward was inspiring.”

Although the varsity team did not place as well as they would have liked, there were still some good performances. Seniors Brendan Chaltin and De’Andre Klein placed first and third in the 200-meter dash. Klein also placed third in the 55-meter dash. Senior Jackson Bode placed second in the 600-meter run and third in the 800-meter run. Senior Timothy Stevenson placed fourth in the two-mile, and finally, junior Brendan Hill placed third in the pole vault.

Now that the indoor season has come to a close, the team heads into the outdoor season which brings new excitement and possibilities.

“We have some guys who were out, but have just been cleared to run and haven’t run in the meets yet, so we’re just adding more as we go into outdoor,” Sundberg said. “We also have the opportunity to run more races outside because we have the 100-meter dash and the four by one relay.”

In addition to the 100 and 400-meter relay, the outdoor season also adds the 300-meter intermediate hurdles and discus, giving more athletes chances to get better and score in future meets. So with the team’s first outdoor meet on Apr. 4 and state only two months away, their season is ramping up quickly, but the boys will take it head on.