Redondo, Costa capture Bay League track and field titles
Mira Costa’s Thomas Velvin outruns his opponents to win the Bay League title in the 800 meter race. Photo
Mira Costa’s boys track and field team narrowly won the Bay League title Friday but it was Redondo’s girls team that continued to dominate the event.
The Lady Sea Hawks captured the track team’s 10th consecutive Bay League title, once again proving the dominance the squad has had under head coach Bob Leetch.
Redondo scored 176 points, well ahead of Mira Costa (125) and Leuzinger (95) and were led by
League champions Eve Divinity, who set a personal record of 59.97 seconds in the 400, Katherine Kluver (long jump, 17-0.75) and Amari Turner (pole vault, 12-08).
Redondo has come a long way under Leetch’s guidance, but the coach is not pleased by the league’s new format.
“When we first took over the program back in 2005 the thought of winning any Bay League meet seemed pretty daunting,” Leetch said. “The track programs at Redondo were pretty down and it was exciting to talk about where the programs were headed.”
But not everyone was on board and there were a lot of snickers. Eventually, the Sea Hawks began to have success and things started to fall into place.
“Friday night our girls won their tenth straight Bay League Championship title,” Leetch said. “The first nine years the girls were undefeated in League contests. This year the schools in the area have decided against league meets, which I think is a huge mistake. The league finals typically determines the individual league champs and serves as the qualifier to CIF. It also determines the team standings as well.
“We had to pull a couple of our top athletes out of events to save them for CIF next week and were worried we had compromised our chance for another league title, but we stepped up in other areas to secure the title.”
Mira Costa was led by freshman phenom Dalia Frias who won the 1600 with a personal best 5:02.41 and the 3200 (11:03.70).
Katelyn Lowry won the triple jump (34-02.75) and Amari Frasier captured the 300 hurdles (45.86) along with being a member of the Mustang’s champion 4×400 Relay team with Natalie Cervantes, Kali Mashayekhi and Sara Mooney.
Mira Costa won the boys title, scoring 116 points to edge Peninsula (111) and Leuzinger (98).
The Mustangs were led by Bay League champions Thomas Velvin (800, 1:58.00), Cy Chittenden (3200, 9:28.37) and Brent Boone, who set a personal record in the triple jump (44-03).
“Like the girls, the boys were without their top two sprinters but did not have the depth to overcome those lost points,” Leetch explained. “Losing Anthony Zaunich for the season due to injury the week before finals hurt. For the last two years he has been the dominant sprinter in the area and was very excited about moving into the championship part of the season.
Redondo did have two champions who set personal bests in Justin Yaskowitz (high jump, 6-04) and Daniel Hatakeyama (pole vault, 13-09).
“We are hoping the committees that matter will allow our league to return to the dual meet format. These kids really deserve the excitement of head to head dual meets. The consensus around the finals meet with the other coaches was that this year was a major step back for our sport in the South Bay.”
On Saturday, the track and field CIF qualifiers will travel to Trabuco Hills for the Division 1 prelims.