Teams prepare for the postseason

By Robert Sisk

Published: May 7, 2008

FORT DEFIANCE — Fort Defiance’s Katie Cummings’ last throw rattled off the net that protected spectators from errant discus throws. It wasn’t the way that the Indians’ all-time leading point scorer wanted to go out during her last home meet, but she still walked away with a first place finish.
“It’s really exciting,” Cummings said. “I didn’t expect to lose, but it would have been nice to get a [personal best]”
Cummings won the discus on Wednesday at the City-County outdoor track meet at Fort Defiance, despite scratching her last throw.
Wednesday’s meet capped off the Bridgewater-bound Cummings’ regular season at the Reservation, and now she’s preparing for the bigger prize — a Group AA championship.
“We are getting to the wire and so I’m working on technique,” she said. “That’s what is going to get me those extra feet.”
Another usual suspect on top of the podium, the Indians’ Whitney Fulk, left Wednesday’s meet with the same feelings as her teammate. Fulk, a junior, ran a 5-minute, 43-second, 1600-meter run that was good enough to earn the gold, but wasn’t what the Southern Valley District cross country champion wanted.
“I was just trying to go out and run and do the best I could,” Fulk said. “It wasn’t my best time, I think I started to fast and kinda got a little excited in the beginning. I just want to keep breaking my time down and the girls I have been close to for most of the season, I want to keep beating them.”
The outdoor track postseason is almost on both Group AA title contenders, and they are making their final preparations along with the rest of the athletes that competed in the annual City-County meet, that four of the five Southern Valley District teams competed in, along with the three Augusta County Shenandoah District schools.
In the boys shot put Fort Defiance’s Luke Tomason took first with a 44-foot, 6-inch throw, beating the Cougar’s Jake Craig and J.D. Rines by half a foot.
Wilson Memorial’s Tiffany Crosby took first in the 100-meter hurdles with a 16.7 second run and the Green Hornets’ Jed Curtis took gold in the boys 110-meter hurdle with a 16-second run
Robert E. Lee’s Rajah Jenkins and Chris Williams finished one-tenth of a second apart in the boys 100-meter dash, with Jenkins edging Williams with a 11.5-second run. Wilson’s Josh Stewart finished third at 11.7 seconds.
Jenkins (21 feet, 6 inches) also win the long jump with Waynesboro’s Terrell Thompson (20 feet, 11¼ inches) taking second.
Fort Defiance’s Jake Shreckhise ran away with the boys pole vault, with a 12-foot, 6-inch jump.
The Cougars’ top-two high jumpers took first and second in the high jump with Christina Fenske taking first with a 5-foot, 7-inch jump and Caitlynn Filla finishing at 5 feet, 2 inches.
Robert E. Lee’s Andrew Lightner narrowly escaped the Cougars’ Lucas Moffett in the 1600-meter running a 4:41. Moffett crossed the line at 4:49.
Complete results were not available to The News Virginian at presstime. Got to http://www.NewsVirginian.com for team scores and more results.