On Friday the Franklin Track program hosted the Bartt Owens Invitational. This meet is in remembrance of 1990 Franklin graduate Bartt Owens who was a 3 time varsity letter winner in track and a 4 time varsity letter winner in cross country. On February 12th, 2002 Bartt died along with 9 other American servicemen when their helicopter was shot down off the coast of the Philippines. It was a great day to race and the weather held out just long enough for us to get the whole meet in.
For the women’s team the Wildcats were led by Sienna Finton who finished first in high jump with a season best of 5 feet. She also second in the 300 hurdles, as well as being part of the 3rd place 4x2 relay and the 4th place 4x4 relay. We also got some great individual performances from Laila Black, 3rd in the 800, Gigi Perkins 7th in the 800, Millie Nau, 3rd in pole vault, Jaylene Ashley, 6th in shot put and 7th in discus, Savannah Steiner, 7th in the 200 and Brooklyn Hall, 7th in the 3200.
The men’s team was led by Elijah Koss with 20 points from finishing first in both the 110 and 300 hurdles. Raph Ballard had a new personal best in long jump and came away with second place overall. 3rd place finishes were recorded by the 4x800 meter relay team of Tre’son Henley, Oliver Oldeman, Daniel Osborne and Donovan Schuyler, as well as the 4x200 meter relay team of Michael Spencer, Bryce Jordan, Sebastian Perez and Raph Ballard. 4th place finishes came from Hunter Cook in the 110 hurdles, Raph Ballard in the 200, Michael Spencer in the 400 and Christian Knipper in the Shot put. It was a great showing from the team overall and earned them a 4th place team finish.
The track teams have one final tune-up meet next Wednesday at Lebanon before heading to the post season, starting with the SWBL meet on Wednesday May 13th at Ross.