Hood River Valley’s first track and field district meet in the Northwest Oregon Conference led to 30 individual district places (top eight finishers) and 13 qualification spots in this week’s Class 5A state meet.
The Eagle girls finished fourth at the district meet, held last Thursday and Friday at Hare Field in Hillsboro. HRV boys team was fifth. As expected, Wilsonville won the girls and boys district meet team titles.
The district meet field was stacked with 17 NWOC district individual champions from 2022. But three schools, including HRV, joined the league this past fall.
“We competed at where we thought we would be and more,” Eagle Coach Brandon Bertram said. “Our top-end athletes, who are seniors, really shined … In a very tough Northwest Conference … Their performances speak for themselves.”
Hood River did not have the depth to challenge for the team crowns, but the Eagles nabbed some of the 15 individual event titles and two relay crowns. The top two finishers in each event qualified for this weekend’s (May 26-27) Class 5A state meet at Hayward Field in Eugene. There were five wildcard berths to the state meet statewide in 5A and a few of those spots were grabbed by Coach Bertram’s athletes.
Bertram’s boys team was led at district by school record-breaking seniors Shaw Burns and Elliot Hawley. Burns is ranked first in state 5A in the long jump and third in the NWOC in the triple jump. He finished second at district in the long jump at 21-6; Treyson Wakefield of Canby won the event at 22-0.5. Those two competed again in the triple jump, with Wakefield — the state leader in that event — winning at 43-11; Burns finished fifth at 40-5.
Hawley, part of a deep and talented conference pool of HRV distance runners, earned a state meet berth with his third-place finish in the 3000 meters on Thursday in a near-PR time of 8 minutes, 46.92 seconds. A day later, Hawley earned another wildcard berth to state with his third-place finish in the 1500 in a school record 3:59.18. Hawley owns school records in the 800, 1500 and 3000.
“He just added onto his stellar season,” Bertram said. “He’s been preparing for this season his entire high school career.”
Sophomore teammate Logan King was sixth in 9:10.07 — a six second PR and No. 9 on HRV’s all-time list. King was seventh and teammate William Bunch eighth in the 1500. Jackson Bullock finished third in the 800 on Friday in a PR 1:59.01 — which earned him a wildcard berth.
HRV had the first and second ranked boys vaulters in district in freshman Francisco Solberg and senior Robert Wood. Wood matched his PR of 12-0 to finish second. Solberg was third at 11-6. Cole Cantrell was fourth in the javelin, with a PR toss of 139-4.
HRV junior Simone Tillman entered the district meet among the top three in the NWOC in five individual events. Her two days at the NWOC finals included a third-place finish in the long jump (16-4.25) on Thursday, she also ran prelims in the 400 and 200 (26.15 PR and No. 5 all-time in school history).
On Friday, Tillman won the 400 in a personal record 58.81, the 200 in a PR 26.04, and ran a leg on HRV’s third place 4x400 relay (4:22.94). Joining her on the relay was Cristine Kinoshita, Ximena Santillan and Olivia Nickson.
“Simone is such a silent, confident competitor,” Bertram said of the talented Eagle athlete, who missed district and state last season because of illness.
In field events, Sylvaine Farr earned a wildcard berth to state in a very competitive girls pole vault. The sophomore finished sixth, but her best vault of 9-2 was good enough to earn her a spot at state.
Kinoshita qualified for two finals on Thursday. She placed sixth in the 100 final on Friday in 13.81 seconds and was fourth in the 200 in a PR 27.58. She also joined Sydney Barrs, Eve MacPherson, and Santillan on the Eagles’ fourth place 4x100 relay (53.59).
Nickson ran a lifetime best in the 800 on Saturday and finished third by .04 to Gabriella Salvoine, 2:23.80 to 2:23.84. Nickson’s come-from-behind time was a six-second PR.
Santillan ran a lifetime best of her own in Thursday’s 300 hurdle prelims (48.51, No. 4 all-time at HRV) and 49.67 on Friday for second place and a state meet berth. She matched that finish in the 100 hurdle final with a PR 17.04 clocking.
The first four finishers in the race — including Freimuth — eventually earned spots at state after the wildcard berths were decided Saturday night.
Nickson was joined in the 800 final by Sadie Baumann, who finished sixth 2:34.63 (and ran a PR 2:34.53 in the prelims), and Alex Bronson, who was eighth in 2:49.7 (after a season best 2:42.6 in the prelims).
Senior Phoebe Wood and freshman Syl Perrin finished fifth and seventh — 11:21.47 and a PR 11:27.97, respectively.
“This will be the end of a fantastic high school career for Phoebe,” Bertram said. “Being in the NWOC it’s hard to get out of it sometimes as a state qualifier. I’m really excited for what Phoebe has done for the program.”
That includes winning an individual district cross country championship and qualify for the state track meet as a junior.
Other PRs at district for the Eagle boys included: Jacob Smith (24.94 200); Jerry Serrano (18-11.25 long jump); and Jack Miller (134-3 javelin). Another HRV trackster who PR’d at district was senior Lauraine Smith (1:09.08, 400).
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