“Competing at Drake…” “Qualifying for Drake…” “Being here at Drake…”
That’s all athlete speak for Drake Relays. I’ve found this out in the two years I’ve covered area high school athletes at the Drake Relays. Current and former athletes seem to rarely tell me they are competing in the Drake Relays.
For the second year in a row, I witnessed area high school athletes compete against the best-of-the-best of Iowa, no matter small school or large school. This year we had athletes from Newton, Collins-Maxwell/Baxter and Prairie City-Monroe at the 2015 Drake Relays.
Goals are set by the high school athletes and one of those goals is to qualify to compete at the Drake Relays. That’s a tough order to fill, but we’ve had a lot of young men and women work hard and have competed even in the two years I’ve been covering. There’s a history among our five area high schools at Drake.
As for the Drake Relays, it is much like the Kansas Relays in Lawrence. You have the world class athletes, the university and college athletes and the high school athletes competing in one place over several days. Newton High senior Sarah Kalkhoff said it was a great way to prepare for college track and field competition next year.
There’s a tremendous atmosphere surrounding the event.
As for the weather, that’s a different matter.
A year ago, which was my first Drake Relays, Thursday afternoon and evening’s competition was cool and damp. It had rained a lot before hand. Everyone had rain gear, but the three area high school athletes got through their competitions without rain. Friday turned out to be a great day to compete with plenty of sunshine.
This year it was the opposite. Thursday afternoon was a perfect day for field events and running events at Drake’s Blue Oval. Then came Friday — cool, overcast, wind and rain off and on. Saturday’s final day of action of the 106th Drake Relays had to work around rain.
Here’s to all those area athletes who competed in the 2015 Drake Relays. They all return to work with their teammates toward the state qualifying track meets on May 14. They all want to be back on the Blue Oval in May.
Iowa Speedway is revving up and ramping up for the 2015 racing season. The Speedway held its seventh annual Sponsor Summit Thursday at the track’s media center. Opening weekend is May 16-17 with the NASCAR Xfinity Series and K&N Pro Series on The Fastest Short Track on the Planet.
Iowa Speedway President Jimmy Small and others made presentations to a lot of the Speedway’s sponsor partners on Thursday. It was an inside look at the business of NASCAR and to Iowa Speedway. NASCAR is in its second year of ownership of the track at Newton with Small in charge.
The morning-long session was geared to businesses that make the local track go. The summit brought together the big and small companies. Small and others involved with the racing facility were out to attract sponsors from outside the racing community to help widen the audience for motorsports and create new fans.
“We own it that we are The Fastest Short Track on the Planet,” Small said. “We committed to making this not just a tremendous racing experience for fans, but a great entertainment experience from the concourse midway with all the fan activities, the season-ticket holder extra benefits and the post-race concerts. You all have product sponsorship involved in all those areas.”
There are 10 total events scheduled for the four racing weekends at Iowa Speedway in 2015. It’s coming up fast, so get ready racing season in Newton.
Man, my Kansas City Royals have gotten off to a great start in 2015, but … what are they doing with these fights? I want my team to stand up for itself. Royals’ players have been hit by pitches a Major League Baseball most this season, and we’re not even through a month of the season.
The Royals need to control their emotions better. I don’t like seeing brawls every game, even though I believe — as a fan — the other guys started it. Take our punishments and move forward. They all need to get back to just playing baseball.
Let’s see Kansas City has had issues with the Oakland A’s, the Chicago White Sox and the Los Angeles Angels — all teams the Royals went through to get into the playoffs last year and to the World Series. How dare those upstart Royals, who hadn’t been relevant in the American League let alone MLB as whole in more than 20 years, challenge those teams. Just saying.
Today, my Dad is 88. One reason I haven’t been at a Drake Relays’ Saturday competition is it falls on a weekend we celebrate Dad’s birthday. I made quick trip to Kansas over the weekend.
Dad and his four children were together Saturday. He wanted to go to the Kansas State Purple and White spring football game held at Sporting Park in Kansas City, Kan. So, we went as a Wildcat Family. It was great for all of us to be together. We took loads of photos in our K-State gear.
The game wasn’t took impressive, as KSU head coach Bill Snyder said, there’s a lot the Wildcats have to work on before the fall. We all have faith in Snyder and he will have the Cats ready come late August.
Contact Jocelyn Sheets at
641-792-3121 ext. 6535
or jsheets@newtondailynews.com