Hurdles lead Cardinal girls to fifth at home meet

All four members of the Newton girls track and field state-qualifying shuttle hurdle relay team are back this season.

A host of new Cardinals also are making impacts in the hurdle events.

Newton’s roster is deep on hurdlers and it showed during the Newton Cardinal Coed Invitational on Friday.

The squad won the race with a Drake Relays qualifying time and a second shuttle hurdle team placed third at H.A. Lynn Stadium.

Addy Terpstra also bettered her Drake Relays qualifying time in the 100-meter hurdles as the Cardinals scored 80.5 points and placed fifth in the 10-team field.

“We are always talking about the competition and how much we have to be on every meet to keep our spots,” Terpstra said. “I feel like it will come down to determination. Whoever wants those spots more will get them.”

ADM won the girls team title with 150.5 points and the rest of the top five included Ames (128), Pella (114), Clear Creek-Amana (92) and Newton (80.5).

The rest of the field featured Oskaloosa (72), South Tama County (53), Grinnell (32), Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont (7) and Saydel (1).

The four girls who teamed up to win the shuttle hurdle relay on Friday may not be on the team if it qualifies for state later this season.

Unfortunately, Newton girls track and field co-head coaches Rachel Tomas and Rachelle Tipton haven’t gotten a lot of practice time outside to see just who rises to the top of the competition.

Terpstra likely stays as the relay’s anchor though. She was fantastic in the 100 hurdles again, this time placing first in front of her home crowd.

She got out to a slow start but caught up to STC’s JoJo Tyynismaa, who also is a Drake Relays qualifier, and won the race with ease in a career-best 15.11 seconds. Tyynismaa was the runner-up in 15.79.

“Getting out of the blocks determines your race. That’s what I have been told,” Terpstra said. “I worked more on the blocks and I worked on attacking the first two hurdles in the offseason. It was a slow start tonight, but I was able to catch up. Three stepping them has helped a lot.”

The shuttle hurdle relay teams placed first and third overall but only the winning team of Macy Lampe, Emma Rogers, Chloe Rorabaugh and Terpstra were able to score team points.

That foursome crossed the finish line in a season-best time of 1 minute, 8.7 seconds. That was fast enough to qualify for the Drake Relays, too.

The second shuttle hurdle relay team was third in 1:14.38. That group featured Alyssa Beerends, Gracie Clayton, Annie Main and JaQuay Priest. Beerends and Priest were on last year’s state qualifying team.

“It can make you nervous because those other girls can take your spot at any time,” Rorabaugh said. “I have been practicing on weekends and working on the blocks. I need to get faster out of the blocks, but I’m doing what I can to stay on that team. The rush I get from that event is so fun. It’s so competitive too.”

The Cardinals faced a tough field on Friday. The only other win came from Marissa Cunningham in the discus. She won the event with a career-best toss of 109 feet, 8 inches.

Alyssa Shannon placed third in two individual distance races. She was third in the 800-meter run in 2:28.57 and then finished third in the 1,500 in 5:18.97.

The other top-six performances came from Alex Riney (career-best 4-10) in the high jump, Clayton (1:18.36) in the 400 hurdles, Bella Winther (1:05.57) in the 400 and Abby Bruce (career-best 28.64) in the 200. All four athletes placed sixth.