Records fell, and they fell hard at the Jefferson District indoor track meet Wednesday afternoon.
First Western Albemarle’s girls broke the 4×800 record, then another Western Albemarle runner, N.C. State-bound Mattie Webb broke the 1600 record. A little while after that, Fluvanna County’s Chance Parmly shattered the pole vault record by five inches and then Webb capped the night with a scorching 3200-meter time, breaking the previous record by 27 full seconds.
All the while in the team championship race, Western’s girls built a solid lead over second place Louisa County, while on the boys side Louisa County pieced together an insurmountable lead of the Warriors’ boys to win the title.
And while the record-breaking events were thrilling, one late race provided a lot of drama as well as Monticello’s Nathaniel Hermsmeier and Western’s David Taylor re-created last year’s 3200-meter outdoor race almost frame-for-frame. Lap after lap on the 160-meter track at Fork Union, Hermsemeier sat on Taylor’s heel, letting Western’s sophomore set the pace.
“Last year at outdoor districts it kind of went down the same way,” Hermsmeier said. “I thought the same strategy would work again and I was lucky to have (a final kick) in me.”
And while Taylor knew he was back there lurking, he knew he was going to have to do something special to hold the Monticello junior there.
“Last year he let me lead the whole thing till a lap left,” Taylor said. “I tried to react today and I just let him get a bit too far away. I was trying to make him hurt throughout the race because he’s got a good kick.”
Taylor nearly held him off, with Hersmeier’s now well-known kick allowing him to edge Taylor with a 9:56.86 to Taylor’s 9:57.48. Taylor was completely exhausted after the race, another classic in what’s becoming an incredible duel between the two runners each time they both take the track.
“He really wants to beat me and I really don’t want him to beat me,” Hermsemier said. “But’s it’s really fun to race him.”
In the end though it was Tony Green and Louisa on the boys side that wrapped up the title. Green won the long jump, the triple jump, the 55-meter hurdles finished fourth in the high jump and finished second in the 55-meter dash. He also ran a leg of Louisa’s 4×200 championship team. That’s 43 individual points and a contribution on a 10-point relay title race. His 43 individual points were nearly the difference separating Western and the Lions.
For his efforts, Green earned athlete of the year in the JD, but reagrravated a groin injury in the high jump.
Right behind him in the Louisa point totals was Corrinn Harris, who won the 300-meter, took second in the triple and long jumps and also ran on the 4×200 squad.
“Our goal was to get Corrinn and I at one-two in all of the jumps and we did that,” Green said. “We help each other reach higher levels.”
Parmly’s Fluvanna managed to finish third, with a big boost from his record day on the vault, beating Western’s Zach Lawson’s 2010 mark of 13-feet-11 with a 14-foot-4. Parmly hadn’t been able to clear the height in practice, but the adrenaline Wednesday night as the crowd began to rally around the vaulter via announcements from the scorer’s table gave him an extra dose of energy.
“The crowd really helps you out,” Parmly said. “I knew (that vault) was in me, I just didn’t know when it was going to come out.”
Parmly nearly cleared 14-foot-7, with his chest barely grazing the crossbar on the second attempt of three.
Isaac Robinson managed to win the high jump for Monticello. Charlottesville swept the shotput on the boys and girls side with Valerie Washington and Jerome Jordan winning the JD title. Tyrone Ellis grabbed the 55-meter title, blazing to a 6.57 second finish to edge out Green for the win.
On the girls side, Webb won JD athlete of the year for her mind-bending performance. Without anyone to really pace her in the 3200-meter race she crushed former Western runner Jessica Fanning’s 2004 record, the second Fanning-set mark she’d broken after the 1600-meter win.
“After a couple of laps I felt pretty good and was under the time my coach wanted me to get so I was like, hey, maybe I can get under 11 minutes,” Webb said. “So I gave it a good shot.”
Webb clocked in at 10:59.64, just under 11 minutes.
The Western unit of Olivia Hajek, Emily Moffett, Killian O’Connell and Claire Johnson topped the 2010 record set by O’Connell and three other teammates in the 4×800. The Warriors’ win continue a now long streak of strong 4×800 teams. The Warriors also got a big boost from sophomore Ely Crisler’s long jump championship and the middle distance unit’s depth. Claire Johnson and Sachi Ragosta finished second and fourth in the 1600-meter run behind Webb.
