San Dieguito Mustangs had a strong presence at Avocado East League Track and Field Finals, at Del Norte High School yesterday. Many school records were broken. The top performers will advance to CIF Prelims on May 21 at Mt. Carmel High School.

Although the advances to CIFs are individual, teams were still given overall scores. San Dieguito men tied for fifth place with San Pasqual, and the women got third place, topping San Marcos, Mission Hills, and Escondido. Del Norte won both men’s and women’s.

There were six teams including San Dieguito, Mission Hills, San Marcos, Escondido, Del Norte, and San Pasqual.

Top performers included senior Jonathan Muschell, who got third in the 100 meter race and broke the school record by .36 seconds, with an impressive time of 11.38 seconds. He also placed first in the long jump, breaking the school record as well with a distance 22 feet 1.5 inches, 7.5 inches. Additionally, he placed third in the triple jump with a distance of 41 feet and 9 inches, which also broke the current school record of 41 feet and 3 inches.

The stone bleachers were unusually packed compared to prior track meets, filled with students, families, and friends. Some spectators had megaphones in order to overpower the volume of the crowd.

Freshman Logan Thralls got third in the 800-meter race, with a time of 1:58.85.

Junior Ross Urbina placed third as well in the 3200-meter race, with a time of 9:45.53. His race had 24 athletes in total, making it the biggest.

The three San Dieguito pole vaulters finished in the top four out of 11. Sophomore Kevin Ward won pole vault, reaching a height of 12 feet and 10 inches. He holds the current school record of 13 feet and 2 inches. Juniors Jed Jirak and Ian Kellog reached 12 feet and 4 inches, which resulted in a triple second place tie with a Mission Hills sophomore.

Sophomore Nadia Haghani finished third in the 110m hurdles, with a time of 17.11 seconds.

Senior Annie Abicca took second place in pole vault, breaking the school record with a height of 9 feet and 9 inches.

Medals were handed out to the top four winners in each event, who stood on podiums. All the results with names were called out by the announcer.

The meet ran smoothly, although during the women’s 4×400 meter race, the timer wasn’t attached to the starting gun which meant that they needed to start over. They redid it after the men’s 4×400 meter race in order to give the first women runners extra time to recover.

For more results and information about other athletes that competed, click here.

The following athletes will be moving on to CIF Prelims:
Boys
Nicholas Haghani 4 x 400m relay, 400m
Marco Jewell 4 x 400m relay, 1600m
Jed Jirak pole vault
Ian Kellog pole vault
Craig Kimball 4 x 400 relay, 800m
Joey Landers 100m hurdles, high jump
Jonathan Muschell 100m, 200m, long jump, triple jump
Anthony Sommers shot put, discus
Westin Swinicki 4 x 400m relay
Logan Thralls 4 x 400m, 800m
Ross Urbina 3200m
Kevin Ward pole vault

Girls
Annie Abicca pole vault
Cole Christian 4 x 100m relay, 4 x 400m relay
Sierra Gasperoni 800m
Nadia Haghani 100m hurdles, 300m hurdles
Darian Haseyama 4 x 100m relay, 100m, 200m
Christina Herrera 4 x 100m relay, 100m hurdles
Sophie Hughes 100m hurdles
Michaela Lafferty 1600m, 4 x 400m relay
Sarah Lavake 4 x 400m relay
Monica Luong 4 x 100m relay, 100m, 4 x 400m relay
Sophia McAndrews 300m hurdles
Alexis Price 3200m
Yarisette Sequeira 800m, 4 x 400m relay