MVHS Track Wins Southern 3A Regionals

By DAVE BELCHER

The Progress

Moapa Valley High School hosted the southern 3A regional Track and Field finals on Friday, May 21. It wasn’t much of a competition. The Pirates dominated the tournament with both boys and girls winning their team titles. The MVHS boys won with 242 points. Virgin Valley placed second with 111 points. The Moapa Valley girls won with 285.5 points. Boulder City placed second with 106 points. Virgin Valley placed third with 83.5 points.

The story for the Pirate boys was in the middle and long distance runners. Moapa swept the medals in the 800, 1600 and 3200 finishing in the first four spots in all of those events.

Senior Preston Humes won all three, with plenty of distance between him and his fellow teammates. He won the 800 meters with a time of 2:00.87, a personal record. His first place 1600 meter time was 4:48.81. Finally he ran the 3200 meter with a time of 10:16.75. He did all of that in just one day of competition.

Cyrus Katich, a sophomore, placed second in the 1600 and 3200 meters. He finished third in the 800. Ethan Witter took second place in the 800 while Maximus Shambaugh finished in fourth place. Marcus Shambaugh finished third in the 1600, just ahead of his broter Maximus.

Marcus also finished third in the 3200 with Preston Bushman placing fourth. All four Pirates ran the race in under 11 minutes.

Fifth place finisher Owen Rappleye of Virgin Valley was the first Bulldog across the finish line in the 3200 meters. Rappleye also finished fifth in the 1600. Ruben Silveyra placed sixth for the Dawgs in the 800.

CJ Anderson came away with a second in the 110 hurdles and a fourth in the 300 hurdles.

Garrett Clove took second in the 300 hurdles while Hunter Davis finished fourth in the 110 hurdles.

The Moapa Valley 4X400 and 4X800 relay teams crowned champions with times of 9:20.90 in the 4X800 and 3:50.76 in the 4X400. The 4X400 team consisted of Davis, Ethan Witter, Trevor Witter and Maximus Shambaugh. The 4X800 team had Marcus Shambaugh, Ethan Witter, Katich and Humes. This team performance gave Humes a fourth gold medal in the regional event.

Virgin Valley placed second in the 4X800 with members Jared Mercado, Rappleye, Miseal Rodriguez and Silvevra.

The Bulldog 4X400 team finished third place with Riley Averett, Cameron Noel, Mercado and Rodriguez.

The Pirate 4X200 team placed second with Jayme Carvajal, Anderson, Austin Heiselbetz and Clove running in the event.

Moapa Valley’s 4X100 placed third. This team included Carvajal, Heiselbitz, Neilson and Anderson.

Eli Cox of MVHS won the shotput event with a throw of 40-11.5, and the discus with a personal record of 114-6. Ryan Bruehl of Virgin Valley placed 4th in the shotput event with a throw of 37-09.50. Sione Tupou took fifth shotput for VVHS at 35-07.00. Toupou also placed fifth in the discus at 90-04.
Averett won the pole vault event for the Dawgs with a vault of 9-06. Wyatt Clove place second for Moapa Valley at 9-00.00. VVHS athlete Dylan Vellinga placed fourth at 7-06.00.

Jayme Carvajal won the long jump for the Pirates with a leap of 20-06, a personal record. Virgin Valley’s Jimmy Kelly placed second at 19-05.5. MVHS athletes Garrett Clove Peyton Neilson took third and fourth in the event with 19-01 and 18-04.5 repectively.

Jimmy Kelly of Virgin Valley won the triple jump flying 41-01, a personal record.
Kelly also placed second in the high jump at 5-10.00, another personal record. Neilson placed third for the Pirates in the event.

In the sprints Austin Heiselbitz placed third in the 100 meters with a time of 11.77. ,

Kelly took 3rd place in the 200 meters at 24.04, with Heiselbetz right at his heels in 4th at 24.07.

Trevor Witter placed second in the 400 meters for Moapa Valley at55.49, a personal best.

On the girls side there were some local standouts who excelled at Regionals

Distance runner Emma Humes won three events. She was out ahead on the 800 meters at 2:31.75, a personal record. On the 1600 meter race she won with a time of 5:27.81 another personal record. Then she won the 3200 as well with a time of 12:34.67. That is three miles of first-place racing.
VVHS athlete Jenna Walters took 4th in the 800 meters at 2:40.03, a personal best.

McKinley Bledsoe got a 4th place finish in the 1600 meter with a personal record time of 6:12. Bledsoe also came in 4th in the 3200 meters at 14:36.54.

Hanna Watson has dominated her events during her track career.

On Friday, Watson won the pole vault, 8-06, she is the state champion who hasn’t been able to defend due to the pandemic. She likely would have won three state titles to her name had there been a state competition over the past two years.

Watson won the long jump, 15-05.5. In 2nd place was Adison Snyder at 14-11 and Rainee Brito at 14-08.5, both competing for VVHS.

Watson took first in the triple jump at 33-08.5. Pirate athlete Shanlin Totten took third.
In the 100 meter hurdles, Skotlyn Hill took first with a time of 16.54. Watson took second at 17.11. Addison Snyder took 4th in the event for Virgin Valley.

Hill also won the 300m hurdles, 48:02. Talley Blackwell took second place with a personal best of 53.31. Snyder took 3rd place at 54.88.

Sydney Reese broke the school record again and took first place in the high jump event with a jump of 5-04. Hill took 2nd at a personal record, 5-01.00. Virgin Valley’s Calla Haviland took 3rd at 5-00, another personal best.

Rainee Brito placed second in the 100 meters for the Bulldogs at 13.51. Allison Mills, a freshman for Moapa Valley, placed third.

Brito was third in the 200 meters with Mills coming in fourth.

Talli Fairchild won the 400 meters with a time of 1:04.1.

The Virgin Valley team of Logan Cude, Snyder, Brito and Haviland won the 4X100 relay with a time of 53.34. Moapa Valley placed second in the event with Makayla Baldwin, Mills, Paige Fairchild and Bailee Andrew.

Moapa Valley won the 4X200 with a time of 1:53.74. On that team was Baldwin, Talli Fairchild, Mills and Hill.

The Moapa team of Brooke Sherwood, Paige Fairchild, Mills and Talli Fairchild won the 4X400 at 4:27.27, . Virgin Valley placed second in the event with Cude, Aracely Lopez, Abby Felix and Haviland.

The Pirates 4X800 relay team finished third with the team of Bledsoe, Marshall, Alena Hull and Sherwood.

Shanlin Totten placed second in the shot put for the Pirates while Kyla Bradshaw placed fourth.
Bradshaw also placed third in the discus while Kayla Walters placed fourth for Moapa.