Newton girls win twice, place fifth at East Marshall

LE GRAND — The Newton girls track and field team was hoping to continue to drop time for Drake Relays qualifying on Thursday.

But a heavy wind was too much to overcome and the times and distances paid the price.

Still, the Cardinals claimed two wins and five top-three finishes and placed fifth in the final team standings.

“It became clear pretty quick that this meet would be all about competing,” Newton head girls track and field coach Rachelle Tipton said. “With Drake approaching, it was hard to let go of times/distances, but that wind was rough.”

Union Community won the meet championship with 133 points. The rest of the top five included Bondurant-Farrar (95), Oskaloosa (81), Roland-Story (81) and Newton (78).

The 14-team field also featured a few athletes from Baxter. The Bolts scored 10 points after Camryn Russell placed third in the 100 hurdles and Makayla True ended up fifth in the 3,000.

Russell’s time was a career-best 16.3 seconds in the hurdles and True finished the 3,000 in a season-best 13 minutes, 9.56 seconds.

Newton’s two wins came in the shuttle hurdle and distance medley relays.

Tori White, Macy Lampe, Mack Sims and Chloe Rorabaugh teamed up to win the shuttle hurdle relay in 1:09.31.

The distance medley relay team featured Abby Bruce, Lola Rivera, Lauren Clarke and Bella Winther and they won the race in a season-best time of 4:41.33.

The lone runner-up finish came from Winther, who posted a career-best time of 28.37 seconds in the 200-meter dash.

White finished third in the high jump with a leap of 4 feet, 10 inches and the sprint medley relay team also was third. That group included Rorabaugh, Bruce, Rivera and Clarke and they finished in 1:59.42.

“Overall, the team adjusted and still competed well,” Tipton said. “They come away from tonight with some lessons learned and some wind resistance training and go into the rest of the season the better for it.”

The Cardinals were fourth in both the 4x400 and 4x800 relays.

The 4x400 relay team featured Alex Riney, Winther, Hailey Dickerson and Peyton Ray and they finished in 4:39.53.

Dickerson, Riney, Ray and Cameron Sharp teamed up in the 4x800 relay. They were fourth in 11:30.56.

Lampe (17.21) and Rorabaugh (17.33) went 5-6 in the 100 hurdles, Bruce (14-8) placed fifth in the long jump and White (1:19.05) was sixth in the 400 hurdles.

The 4x100 relay team of BrookLynn Britton, Clarke, Gracie Clayton and Rivera placed fifth in 54.77.