White, Clarke lead Cardinals at Dickinson Relays

CEDAR FALLS — A pair of career-best performances highlighted the Newton girls’ track and field team during its indoor season opener at the Dickinson Relays on Tuesday.

Tori White’s career-best mark in the high jump propelled her to a sixth-place finish, while Lauren Clarke posted her best time ever in the 400-meter dash and took 11th.

The Newton girls registered seven top-40 finishes, while the Cardinal boys competed on Monday and a pair of relays wound up 40th or better.

“I’m proud of all the competitors tonight,” Newton head girls track and field coach Rachelle Tipton said. “It’s fun to get the meets started and see where the team is at and look forward to where they can go. There is work to be done and May is the goal, but tonight was a great starting point.”

White’s career-best leap in the high jump was marked at 5 feet, 2 inches and she was sixth out of 75 jumpers. White cleared 4-8, 4-10 and 5-0 on her first attempt and secured 5-2 on her third and final try.

The Cardinals had three runners finish in the top 60 in the 400. Clarke led the way in 11th with a personal-best time of 1 minute, 3.08 seconds. Bella Winther also placed 40th in 1:06.19 and Harper Barton was 59th in 1:07.85. There were 155 total runners.

The next best individual finish came in the 60 hurdles as Macy Lampe was 31st in 10.48 seconds. Mack Sims placed 47th out of 150 with a time of 10.72.

Five other individuals had respectable finishes. Lola Rivera placed 48th out of 187 in the 60 dash with a time of 8.63 seconds, Gracie Clayton finished 78th out of 185 in the 200 in 20.85 and Alex Riney, Hailey Dickerson and Peyton Ray also were top 70 in the 800.

Riney led the way in 49th and she posted a time of 2:45.40. Dickerson was 55th in 2:46.7 and Ray took 66th out of 123 with a time of 2:49.02.

The top relay finish came in the 4x800. The team of Barton, Hadley Kruse, Winther and Ray placed 18th out of 45 teams with a time of 10:57.76.

Competing against 67 other teams, the 4x200 relay team finished 31st. The foursome of BrookLynn Britton, Rivera, Clayton and Clarke were clocked in 1:58.07.

The 4x400 relay team of White, Kruse, Dickerson and Riney placed 39th out of 42 with a time of 4:53.67.

The top finish for the Newton boys came in the 4x200 relay. The foursome of Curtis Payne, Nick Thomason, Reilly Trease and Caden Klein took 19th out of 67 with a time of 1:37.94.

The 4x800 relay team of Lance Zaabel, Levi Zaabel, Asher Wood and Landon Menninga finished 40th out of 60 with a time of 9:29.40.

In the 60 hurdles, Trease was 43rd out of 128 with a time of 9.13 seconds.

Thomason and Klein were 44th and 65th, respectively, in the 60 dash. There were 216 runners total with Thomason finishing the race in 7.32 and Klein coming in at 7.45.