April 6, 2006 Issue                                               

©2006 The Chestnut Hill Local

Meet records tumble at CHA Relays
by TOM UTESCHER

CHA’s Phil Thomas contorts to clear the bar at 5’11” and win the high jump. (Photo by Lene White)

There were a few spritzes of rain at the Chestnut Hill Academy track on Saturday, but for the most part Phoebus focused his brilliance upon the fifth running of the CHA relays.

Ten teams assembled for the event, including three of CHA’s Inter-Ac League peers, and during the course of the competition, six meet records fell by the wayside.

CHA’s own Julian McFadden established a new standard of 21’5” in the long jump, where Penn Charter’s Jerry Wells landed in second (20’9.75”), half- an-inch ahead of another CHA Blue Devil, Terrence Williams. A number of triple jumpers surpassed the old record in that event, with the Quakers’ Wells (42’8”) leading the way, followed by Williams (42’4”) and McFadden (41’10.5”).

The Penn Charter quartet of Kashif Smith, Wells, Dareem David and Kamal Marell blazed to new meet records in two relays, the 4 x 100 meters (43.4) and 4 x 200 meters (1:30.1). Girard College came in second in both races (43.9 and 1:34.3), followed in each instance by CHA’s. Rashad Campbell, Tom Samph, Phil Thomas and McFadden ran for the Devils in the shorter event (44.9), and in the four-by-two CHA sent out Ryan Boutcher, Thomas, Julian Brown and Samph (1:35.9).

In the 4 x 400, a new meet mark of 3:33.3 was recorded by Girard College (Willie Williams/Rob Tuck/Daimon Harrington/Terrell Faulcon), which hit the tape just a 10th of a second ahead of Penn Charter (Je’ron Stokes/Brendan McNally/Marell/Dylan Isaacson). A sixth new standard was set by Malvern Prep, which had Paul Winterhalter, Steve McGill, Chris McCullogh and Brian Duffy run 11:03.2 in the distance medley, where the race broke down into legs of 1200, 400, 800,and 1600 meters. Second place in this one went to Germantown Friends School (11:20.7), thanks to sophomore Max Kaulbach, freshman Abdus Muwwakkil, sophomore Jake McKenzie and senior Jonas Crimm.

The Tigers, whose cross country teams have ruled the Friends School League for most of the new millennium, won the other distance relay at Saturday’s meet, the 4 x 800. Kaulbach combined with classmate Isaac Ortiz, senior David Robb and McKenzie to stop the watch at 8:23.4, and another Friends League squad, Friends Central, was the runner-up in 8:36.5. Penn Charter finished third (9:03.1) with the foursome of Torrey Crawford, Dan Lyons, Max Feldman and Ben McGovern.

In the open 1600 meters, GFS had sophomore Brad Thompson come in second (4:51.6) and freshman Eddie Einbender-Luks finish third (4:59.9), behind the winner from Valley Forge Military Academy, Michael Barrow (4:48.8). In the 100-meter dash, meet officials had to sort out four runners who were all timed in 11.1 seconds. First went to PC’s David and second to Charles Gladman of Cardinal Dougherty, while there was a tie for third between Smith of the Quakers and Girard’s Ryan Boskie.

Penn Charter’s speedsters won convincingly in the sprint medley relay (400/200/200/800), where Stokes, Smith, Marell,and Issacson tripped the timer in 3:41.3. The early leader, Malvern (3:48.6) faded to third place behind Neumann-Goretti High School (3:47.9).

Over in the high jump pit, CHA’s Thomas took first place by clearing 5’11”, and second went to GFS sophomore Matt Berson, who crossed a 5’10” bar. In the pole vault, Kelsey Dorwart (11’0”) and Pat Hitschler (10’0”) finished first and third for Penn Charter.

With CHA’s Wayne Crawford ambulating on crutches following recent knee surgery, the door was open for other shotputters at the meet. The defending Inter-Ac champ looked on as the Quakers’ Richard White won with a heave of 46’2.5”, beating out another CHA athlete, Andrew Ciukurescu (second; 45’11.75”).