The Monta Vista forecast for Saturday, April 13th called for sunny skies, warm temperatures, TWO track meets and a likely chance for season and personal bests. Sure enough, things heated up quickly for the team as the boys long jumpers took to the runway at the Bearcat Invitational in San Mateo. In short order, Pranav Pata and Khang Pham both logged personal bests of 18’2” and 17’8”, with Sarang Deshpande joining Pranav over 18’ as well. While the jumpers were flying, Vivian Lau sped around the track in the girls FR/SO 1600, winning in impressive fashion with a time of 5:35.00, just off her PR.
Next up, the Monta Vista sprinters took the track and our 400 runners stepped into the blocks, with senior Reema Apte running a fantastic race to win her heat with a new PR of 63.30! Reema led all the way and was strong down the homestretch to easily best her old PR by over a second and a half. Ananya Rajagopal made it two straight races under 68 and Sean Chen logged a PR of 59.35. Wrapping up the meet were the 100m runners, and Reema made it 2-for-2 on PRs for the day finishing in 14.06. Ethan Crofut capped off Monta Vista’s day at Bearcat with one final PR of 12.58. After Ethan crossed the line it was time for Coach John to gather up the rollers, pack the car and head down to Los Gatos for meet #2 of the day – CCS Top 8!
The CCS Top 8 Invitational is one of the section’s best meets and features the deepest and strongest fields of CCS athletes – the perfect opportunity to test yourself against the best! Just as last year, the weather cooperated and athletes were greeted with ideal conditions to perform. At 3:45 the defending meet champion and defending CCS champion Monta Vista 4×100 team got into their zones and Evelyn How, Brooke Young, Samantha Dunn and Bianca young flew to a season best time of 48.61 to claim 2nd place!! The group is starting to gel nicely, and overcame some illness this past week to get the job done and vault into the #2 CCS position on the season.
The track stayed hot as Bianca Young took 1.5s off her season best, finishing 5th in the 400 for the second season at 59.21, enjoying her return to sub-60 territory and positioned currently #8 CCS. Bianca added a season best in the 200 with her 26.23 time, good for 9th place and #16 CCS on the year. Vishal Koppuru and Arnav Raut ensured that MV boys 400 runners would go three for three on the day as they joined Sean and PR’ed in 53.14 and 52.99 – good for 7th and 5th respectively. The 100 runners took the track next and Monta Vista girls found themselves with two runners in the top heats – Evelyn How (12.58) claiming 6th and Brooke Young finishing 10th with a heat victory and season best of 12.66.
Meanwhile, our field event athletes were having a great day as Brandon Xu got things started with a Triple Jump PR of 39’ 1.25”, good for 12th place. Arnav Raut also went over 39’ to claim 9th. Eric Zheng continued his hot streat in the discus, throwing 121 feet 3 inches to grab silver in the FR/SO event! Eric added a 40 foot throw in the shot to place 10th, with Henry Hodgkins joining him and tossing 38’3.5”.
Andrew Richardson found himself in the top heat of the boys FR/SO 800 and responded in style, notching a PR of 2:03.63 good for 6th place! Despite getting boxed in to start the race he stayed patient, came through in Arnav-type pace (60) and fought hard all the way for his new personal best. Sotirios Kougiouris kept the PR train rolling, running 10.31 seconds in the 65h. As the sun set and the lights came on the 3200 runners took the stage and Triya Roy rose to the occasion with a huge 16 second PR of 11:15.76, notching 9th place and currently 16th on the seasons CCS list! Rohun Agrawal added a new PR of his own, finishing 6th in the Boys fr/so 3200 with a time of 11:52.69.
Capping the night (and 14.5 hour track marathon day) off was the boys FR/SO 4×400 relay team of Vishal, Arnav, Sahil and Andrew. The took the track with some of the top teams in our Conference, including WCAL powerhouses Mitty, St. Francis, Bellarmine, and perennial 4×400 contenders Junipero Serra. Vishal got the team off to a great start and handed off to Arnav who flew around the turn and settled into the lead with Serra hot on his heels. The two runners battled it out all the way and Sahil took the stick and cracked a huge PR split of 55.4 to get the baton to Andrew in second. In typical fashion, Andrew ran a great, even race and fended off challenges from St. Francis and Bellarmine to grab the silver medal for the team. Our FR/SO boys time of 3:34.82 was just 0.6 off the school record and is good for the #18 time in CCS across all divisions!
When all was said and done, Monta Vista steadily earned medals, personal bests and season bests from 9am through 9pm. The team now has 10 days to prepare for the El Camino League Championship meet which starts on Wednesday the 24th, wrapping up on the 26th.
Postseason – here we come!!