Menlo’s Young advances to state high jump finals

“If she won the state high jump, I would not be surprised,” Menlo jumps coach Keith Larson said.

Sequoia senior Abby Goetz also advanced through trials in the girls’ pole vault, while both county standouts in the 1600 — Menlo-Atherton senior Tatum Olesen and Crystal junior Benjamin Bouie — also made the cut. The state finals will be held Saturday in Clovis.

A 5-8 senior, Young needed execute a jump of 5 feet, 5 inches to advance. The field in the girls’ high jump started with 25 of the top varsity athletes in the discipline from around the state. By the time she lined up for her attempts at 5-5, the field had already been narrowed down to 12.

That didn’t stop Young from taking flight in what Larson called the best jump of the night. She missed her first two attempts at 5-5, but got plenty of distance between she and the bar on her third and final attempt.

“She had the best jump of anyone at the competition,” Larson said. “She cleared it by a good three or four inches.”

The bar was not raised beyond 5-5. Other high jumpers to hit a 5-5 were: Brea Olinda’s Julia Teven, Central’s Illicia Ross, Ripon’s Clara Schoolland, Miramonte’s Addison Braitberg, Ventura’s Valentina Fakrogha, Monta Vista’s Lelani Laruelle, St. Mary’s Fekei George and Clovis East’s Indiana Davis.

Young’s personal record is 5-8 from the St. Francis Invitational held March 16.

Bouie seeded seventh in final

With two heats in the boys’ 1600 meters, Bouie did exactly what he needed to do to advance through to the finals. The top-ranked 1600 runner in Northern California took fourth place in his heat with a time of 4 minutes, 10.99 seconds. Top four placers in each heat earned automatic bids to the finals.

“It’s the trials,” Crystal head coach Albert Caruana said. “You’re just trying to advance. Then the race is [Saturday].”

Bouie had the lead during the bell lap, and finished in a cluster with Jesuit’s Jonah Reynolds, Santa Barbara’s Andreas Dybdahl and Ventura’s Anthony Fast Horse. The four finished within four-tenths of a second of one another.

“With 150 meters to go, he was in the lead and four guys came across the line pretty close together,” Caruana said. “So, he advances to the final.”

Bouie was coming off an extraordinary performance at the Central Coast Section Track and Field Championships the previous Saturday in Gilroy. Not only did the junior win the boys’ 1600 championship, he also ran the second leg of the boys’ 4x800 relay withy Crystal taking home the title. He took the baton with Crystal in 14th place, and chased down 13 runners to hand the baton to Dean Wu with the lead.

“That’s what I thought would happen,” Caruana said. “He ran faster at the [West Bay Athletic League] final. Most teams are not going to put their best runner on the second leg ... so that’s the reason it turned out the way it did. But yeah, that was super impressive.”

Olesen, Goetz advance

Olesen is seeded fifth in the girls’ 1600, running her heat in trials in a time of 4:51.25. She took third place in the heat, with Ventura’s Sadie Engelhardt first at 4:50.52, and Santiago’s Braelyn Combe second at 4:50.91.

Goetz qualified in the girls’ pole vault with a top height of 11 feet, 9 inches. Her personal record is 12-3 from the the CCS championships.