CHESTERTON — Falling behind early in the 800 meters is no reason to panic for LaPorte sophomore Katie Pickford.
Pickford, who specializes in come-from-behind victories, edged out Valparaiso’s Samantha Cavanagh by one-hundredth of a second with a first-place time of 2 minutes, 25.27 seconds at Tuesday’s Chesterton Sectional.
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“The last stretch is usually my strongest,” Pickford said. “I’m a person that starts slow and finishes strong. My coach is always nagging on me to get out faster. I knew it was really close. I heard the referee call out, ‘LaPorte,’ but I still wasn’t sure.”
Distance teammate Kailee Schoof called watching Pickford run the 800 one of her favorite parts of each meet.
“It is textbook perfect how she runs the 800,” Schoof said. “I wish I could do that, but I’ll stick with the 3,200 because I can’t be as fast as her. I don’t know how she does it because she goes out slow but then kills it in the end. We all love watching her run the 800.”
Schoof provided a first-place finish of her own in the 3,200 run with a time of 11:35.09. She was followed in the event by teammate Marie Didion, who finished second in 11:37. The Slicers also displayed their distance dominance in the 3,200 relay by winning the event.
Valparaiso posted four firsts while compiling 137 points to win the team title. Chesterton (127), Portage (119) and LaPorte (81) rounded out the top four.
The Vikings took the top two spots in the discus with Madison Ochs and Olivia Murray as Murray topped her personal best by eight feet.
“We don’t really have any standouts, but we’ve got a lot of really good athletes,” Valparaiso coach Adam Nellessen said. “That’s what makes a team, and that’s what we like. Now, the hard part is resetting and getting the girls focused on next week. We have some girls that can compete and make it down to state.”
Cavanaugh finished second in the 800 run despite running the event for only the fourth time in her career.
“That was something I don’t think a lot of people saw coming,” Nellessen said.
Lexi Ferngren also captured her coach’s attention, completing the 1,600 in 5:11.94 to shatter her previous season best of 5:17.28.
Portage’s Victoria Farley turned in an effort of 44 feet, 9 inches in the shot put to establish her new season best and capture first place. Her previous personal best was 42-1.75.
Michigan City’s Jasmine McLemore enjoyed two event wins, taking the 400 in 59.29 and the 100 in 12.64.
“I spent a lot of time warming up and preparing for all of my races,” McLemore said. “That was a lot more important than normal because of the cold. I usually warm up longer than most people, but knowing it was cold I warmed up even more because I didn’t want to cramp up and pull something in the cold weather.”
Vickrey is a freelance writer.