By Senior Correspondent Marty Ogden, Editing and Graphics by Ron Knapp

While many Connecticut athletes traveled globally for vacation or visited family over the holiday break, several Nutmeggers traveled to New York City and Boston to deliver spectacular performances. Let’s recap the performances of those who continued to add to this young season.

U.S. Marine Corps Holiday Classic

The Nike Track & Field Center at The Armory, NY

RESULTS

Photos by John Nepolitan

The Rich brothers are at it once again. Last week Lyman Hall traveled to Boston to compete in The Beantown Winter Classic where they both posted impressive season opening results. This time they took a trip to the Big Apple and continued to show why they are both in contention for some hardware once the championship season arrives in February. 

While this is still very early in the season and most of the nation hasn’t even started competing in indoor track, Aaron Rich won the long jump in a new US#1 of 24-1.75. Even more impressive, it is the 4th best jump in CT history and only 3.5 inches less than Dyshon Vaughn’s CT state record of 24-5.5. He also took 5th in the 300m behind Olympian Quincy Wilson’s meet record of 32.94, finishing in a very impressive PR of 34.79. That performance cracked the CT all time top 20 list and broke the Trojans school record. On top of that he finished 2nd behind his brother in the high jump, clearing 6 feet, 6 inches. 

Ethan Rich won the triple jump with a leap of 43-9.5 and the high jump clearing 6-8. He then took 3rd in the long jump with a 22-6.25 mark. All of these performances either tied or broke his PRs. 

It will be difficult for Lyman Hall to defend their State Open title with only two scorers, but they might have some backup from Christopher Drescher who won the pole vault with a height of 12-9.0. He was the Class M runner-up last year with a height of 14-0 and was 6th at the State Open.

Connecticut athletes were also in the spotlight in the long sprints on Saturday. Finishing close behind Aaron Rich was Immaculate’s Brenan McCabe who took 7th in 35.27. The senior was injured last year, but he was close to his school record of 35.20 he ran two years ago when he was 3rd at New England as a sophomore. Defending New England 600m champion Charles Dalles dropped down in distance and finished 9th, breaking his own Coginchaug school record with a 35.37.

But in the seldom run 400m Cromwell’s Nassyr Andrade took 2nd in another school record of 48.86 which is the 5th fastest performance in state history. According to Coach Joe Asmus he was relaxed, running in the 2nd fastest heat and could have won if they were head to head. 

New Canaan’s dynamic duo of Ryan Monohan and Quinn Kilkenny continue to impress. Monohan ran a New Balance Nationals Indoor qualifying mark of 1:55.74 to take 6th in the Invitational 800m with Kilkenny taking 13th in 1:59.36. The pair returned later in the evening to run the mile with Kilkenny taking 7th in 4:30.84 and Monohan finishing only .01 seconds behind in 8th place. 

Julien Silva, who was 5th at the cross country State Open made his first trip down to the Armory. The Fitch senior took 9th in the mile, running 4:31.73. 

In the throwing circle junior Samuel Binkowski of South Windsor took 2nd in the shot put with a throw of 52-1.5. He is starting off much stronger than last year when he began the season throwing around 47 feet but eventually broke 50 feet for the first time to take 8th at the Open as a sophomore. 

Surprisingly, there weren’t many CT girls who competed on Saturday, but one standout was Brien McMahon’s Gabriella Rivera. She crushed her PR from last year when she was 5th at the State Open in the 55m hurdles, running 8.38 to take 5th place. Her time currently ranks her 2nd in CT. She also came back to take 2nd in the silver 200m with a time of 26.19. 

Breaking her outdoor PR in the 400m, Coginchaug’s Allison Booth took 6th in the Silver section with a time of 1:02.56. 

Cross country All State runner Taylor Mooney of Cromwell took 6th in the 1-mile in a time of 5:36.41

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MSTCA Boston Holiday Challenge 

at the TRACK at New Balance, MA

RESULTS

The Track at New Balance is a relatively new facility, but it is giving track and field athletes another venue to perform in a state-of-the-art facility. It is just under a two-hour drive for much of the state and several Connecticut athletes found it well worth the trip. 

Many of the distance runners are just fresh off the long cross country season, but that didn’t stop the meet organizers from putting together a national class field in the boys 1 Mile Championship race. Carter Smith, the New Balance Nationals Outdoor mile champion traveled from central Pennsylvania to win in a US #1 time of 4:06.76. Taking 7th in the same race was East Lyme’s Sam Leone, a Brooks National Cross Country finalist who ran 4:19.21. 

In the varsity 1600m race Darien’s Andrew Sharron took 2nd in 4:26.91. The senior who was 4th at the State Open last winter is already in mid-season form running just over a half second off his best time last winter. 

Southington’s Katherine Cavanaugh looks to have greatly improved since last year. She has already run faster than she did last year when the Blue Knight was 5th at Class LLs. She was a New England qualifier in cross country for the first time and on Saturday, she finished 6th in a time of 11:25.13 for the 2-miles. 

Fellow Southington Blue Knight, Walker Mierzejewski broke the school record in the 200m Dash with a time of 22.79 to take 4th. This beats the previous school record by .66 seconds. He also finished 4th in the 55m with a new PR of 6.63.

Last year Bethel’s Adrian Vasquez was a member of a strong 4x200m with three seniors that took 4th at the State Open. He is the only member of that team to return for the Wildcats and he looks like he is following in the footsteps of his former teammates. The junior was double winner in Boston, taking the 55m in a PR of 6.57 and the 200m in 22.28. Only two other in-state boys have run faster so far in this young season. 

His teammate Khoa Ly, the Class MM champion in the triple jump last spring, took 3rd on Saturday with a PR of  44-3.25

Xavier and Mercy made the trip to acquire some state qualifying times in the relays. Xavier’s 4x400m team of John Simpson, Brendan Russ, Zander Laudati and Justin Torres totaled 3:33.59 to finish 2nd and Mercy’s team of Veronika Meriano, Cailan Hall, Allison Pelletier and Kyla Dutch crossed the line in 3rd with a time of 4:27.58.It’s not too early to think about your plans for summer training that could include attending the Foss Running Camp!