PIQUA – Eaton’s Chase Smith and Preble Shawnee’s Chase Thompson each qualified for the Division II state track meet with their performances at the Division II Region 8 track meet last week.
Smith, a senior, set a school record in the discus with a throw of 164 feet, 6 inches to place second. Smith had a throw of 159-10 in the prelims, which put him in second place heading into the finals.
The previous record of 161-6 was set in 2004 by Kyle George.
The event was held Thursday, May 24, at Piqua High School.
Adam Riedinger of Springfield Northwestern won the event with a throw of 164-11.
Thompson, a senior, finished third in the long jump to punch his ticket to the state meet, also on Thursday. He landed his qualifying jump of 21-10.75 feet on his first attempt during the preliminary round.
Jonathon Hoerlein of Fenwick has the winning jump of 22-5.75 on his final attempt in the preliminary round. Mykal Bright of Cincinnati Indian Hill was second with a jump of 22-0.25.
Eaton’s girls’ 800-meter relay team set a new personal best time during the preliminaries by over two seconds, but came up short of advancing to the regional final. The foursome of junior Tyler Pittman, freshman Kendall Combs, freshman Kylee Kidwell and sophomore Makenzie Cooper ran at 1:49.52 for the ninth fastest time. The top eight moved on to the final. Their previous best time was 1:51.98, which they accomplished at the district meet the week before.
The same quartet finished 12th in the 400-meter relay with a time of 52.92.
Pittman placed 16th in the long jump with a jump of 13-9.50.
Eaton’s Alex Newport placed 16th in the 1,600-meter run. The junior finished the race in 5:00.53.
The Division II state tournament will be held Friday, June 1 and Saturday, June 2, at Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium on the campus of The Ohio State University.
Smith will compete in the discus on Saturday at 9:30 a.m. He enters the meet with the third best qualifying throw.
Thompson will jump at 9:30 a.m. on Friday. He enters the tournament with the seventh best qualifying jump.
