By Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

SOLON – Like the rest of her Solon teammates Abby Smith was looking forward to her lone chance to compete at home this season.

Smith had a little bit of extra motivation for the annual Denny Gruber Relays.

“It’s really fun because it’s named for my grandpa,” Smith explained. “I always look forward to this meet.”  

That motivation helped Smith turn in her best performance of the season on Tuesday.

Smith finished second in the high jump with a career-best performance and ran on the winning 4×200 relay team to help Solon win the girls team title at a record-breaking edition of the Gruber Relays at Spartan Stadium.  

The Solon girls won five events, including titles from Josie Durr in the high jump and freshman Gabbi Bullard in the 400 hurdles.

Solon won three relay titles on its way to 151 points, 26 more than runner-up Mount Vernon.

“We get a chance to go run in front of everybody and fans kind of hear about you doing well here and there and now they get a chance to see it,” Solon coach Brent Sands said. “I thought for the most part we ran pretty well today, we had some good things and a few of the people that slid into spots came out and performed.”

One of the Spartans that performed well on Tuesday was Smith.

The sophomore cleared a career-best 5-4 in the high jump to finish second to Durr who matched the best performance in the state this season by clearing 5-6.

“I think the biggest surprise was Abby Smith going 5-4 in the high jump,” Sands said. “I watched her go over 4-8 or 4-8 and I thought holy cow she is jumping tonight. That was a huge surprise.

Competing at the event named for her grandfather, Smith was at her all-around best on Tuesday.

She teamed with Khaylor Fleck, Bryn Hanrahan and Erin Kerkhoff to win the 4×200 in 1:47.89 and ran on the 4×400 relay team that placed third.

“It’s definitely a good feeling to be able to win this for him,” Smith said. “He’s working really hard with me and he’s just been a great, great motivator for me to do push myself and do my best.”

The Solon foursome of Hanrahan, Kerkhoff, Molly Duckett and Alexis Sands won the 4×100 in 51.06 and the Spartan squad of Sophie Nicol, Gabbi Bullard, Cayley Annis and Saige Hauer won the 4×800 in 10:22.09.

Bullard and Nicol placed first and third respective in the 400 hurdles while Bullard posting a winning time of 1:06.53.

“She is very effortless,” Sands said of Bullard. “That is a race that is a pretty gutty race and she is able to run it very relaxed and very smooth.”

Nicol was a huge part of the team success from Solon on Tuesday.

In addition to the 400 hurdles and 4×800, Nicol ran on the Solon distance medley team that was second and was a late sub onto the Spartans’ third-place 4×400 team.

“Lately we haven’t been trying to win very meet we’ve just gone out and testing to see how we are doing in each event and coming out pretty close to the top every time,” Nicol said. “Coming here and just running our best and coming out on top that’s all you could ask for.”

On her fourth event and third 400 meter effort of the night Nicol clocked a 1:02 split in the 4×400.

“Sophie had an incredible night,” Sands said. “She jumped into the 4×400 because we had to pull somebody out and she just got done with the 400 hurdles and she ran a 1:02.”

The Solon boys placed fourth with 70 points while Regina was seventh with 33 points.

Tristan Wirfs swept the throwing events and had two of the 17 meet records set on Tuesday (nine girls, eight boys) to lead Mount Vernon to the boys team title with 156 points.

Wirfs won the discus with a toss of 195-2 and took the shot put title with a toss of 64-7 ¼.

Jared Brinkman broke his own school record in the shot put and finished runner-up behind Wirfs in both the shot and discus.

Brinkman posted a toss of 61-4 ½ to break his own school record and posted a toss of 161-5 in the discus.

Solon’s Tyler Linderbaum was third in the shot put and teammate Coal Flansburg was fifth.

Jackson Walker and Linderbaum placed fourth and fifth for Solon in the discus.

“We had a lot of personal bests especially in the throwing events,” Solon coach Mark Sovers said. “When you have Jared Brinkman and Tristan Wirfs and Tyler they just feed off each other. You can just feel the energy and those guys just competing against each other in such a positive way and just bringing out the best in everybody it’s awesome to see.”

Solon’s Luke Ira was second in the 110 hurdles and Regina’s Jayden Kies was third in the 200.

Denny Gruber Relays

Girls

Team scores – 1. Solon 151; 2. Mount Vernon 125; 3. North Cedar 97.5; 4. Marion 68; 5. Vinton-Shellsburg 60; 6. Davenport Assumption 51.5; 7. Dyersville Beckman 18; 11. Regina 11.

Individual Results

(Event winners; area placewinners)

100 – 1. Annie Rhomberg (MV) 12.59; 2. Erin Kerkhoff (SOL) 12.61.

200 – 1. Sarah Schminke (VS) 27.42; 3. Grace Swenning (ICR) 27.69; 4. Khaylor Fleck (SOL) 27.76.

400 – 1. Joy Ripslinger (DA) 56.89; 3. Taylor Ryan (SOL) 1:00.12;

800 – 1. Cassie Cox (NC) 2:21.25.

1,500 – 1. Julie Schumacher (DA) 5:02.81.

3,000 – 1. Julia Schumacher (DA) 10:58.28; 3. Makayla Lindemann (SOL) 12:02.04.

100 hurdles – 1. Catherine Yeoman (MV) 15.73; 3. Alexis Sands (SOL) 16.62; 4. Sayler McIlravy (SOL) 17.38.

400 hurdles – 1. Gabbi Bullard (SOL) 1:06.53; 3. Sophie Nicol (SOL) 1:10.46.

Sprint medley – 1. North Cedar 1:51.74; 2. Solon (Taylor Ryan, Alexis Sands, Bryn Hanrahan, Erin Kerkhoff 1:52.15; 5. Regina (Madeline Adam, Molly Vittetoe, Emma Corkery, Grace Swenning) 1:59.9.

Distance medley – 1. Vinton-Shellsburg 4:26.78; 2. Solon (Alli Prybil, Jess Heick, Sophie Nicol, Gabbi Bullard) 4:29.45.

Shuttle hurdle – 1. Mount Vernon 1:05.99; 2. Solon (Molly Duckett, Rachael Nelson, Peyton Sands, Alexis Sands) 1:07.67.

4×100 – 1. Solon (Bryn Hanrahan, Molly Duckett, Alexis Sands, Erin Kerkhoff) 51.06.

4×200 – 1. Solon (Khaylor Fleck, Bryn Hanrahan, Abby Smith, Erin Kerkhoff) 1:47.89; 6. Regina (Madeline Adam, Molly Vittetoe, Emma Corkery, Grace Swenning) 1:56.58.

4×400 – 1. North Cedar 4:05.93; 3. Solon (Taylor Ryan, Abby Smith, Cayley Annis, Khaylor Fleck) 4:13.35.

4×800 – 1. Solon (Sophie Nicol, Gabbi Bullard, Cayley Annis, Saige Hauer) 10:22.09.

High jump – 1. Josie Durr (SOL) 5-6; 3. Abby Smith (SOL) 5-4.

Long jump – 1. Ella Wischmeyer (MV) 17-5; 3. Jada Murphy (SOL) 15-6 ¾; 5. Jess Heick (SOL) 15-3; 6. Emma Corkery (ICR) 15-2 ¼.

Shot put – 1. Nicole Sander (NC) 36-3; 3. Bryce Hinkel (SOL) 35-7 ¼; 6. Emily Troyer (SOL) 33-4 ½.

Discus – 1. Haley Blazek (MAR) 116-3; 3. Bryce Hinkel (SOL) 105-7; 4. Elli Becicka (SOL) 104-6.

BOYS

Team scores – 1. Mount Vernon 156; 2. Vinton-Shellsburg 109; 3. Marion 103; 4. Solon 70; 5. North Cedar 56; 6. Dyersville Beckman 42; 7. Regina 33; 8. Davenport Assumption 20.

Individual Results

(Event winners; area placewinners)

100 – 1. Mark Brown (DB) 11.28; 3. Hunter Kula (SOL) 11.55; 5. Spencer Wegmann (SOL) 11.58.

200 – 1. Owen Carstensen (MAR) 22.85; 3. Jayden Kies (ICR) 23.48; 4. Jack Jensen (ICR) 23.54.

400 – 1. Seamus Raney (NC) 52.65; 4. Braxton Hobbs (SOL) 55.73.

800 – 1. Jeremy Krogmann (MV) 1:57.98; 3. Graeson Dall (SOL) 2:04.05.

1,600 – 1. Myles Bach (MAR) 4:25.96; 5. Nathan Meyer (ICR) 4:46.14; 6. Ryan Bonthius (ICR) 4:49.15.

3,200 – 1. Liam Conroy (MV) 10:00.96; 6. Tanner Larkey (SOL) 12:02.59.

110 hurdles – 1. Blair Brooks (MAR) 15.32; 2. Luke Ira (SOL) 15.51.

400 hurdles – 1. Mark Brown (DB) 55.86; 6. Thomas Brandt (SOL) 1:02.85.

Sprint medley – 1. Mount Vernon 1:38.77; 2. Solon (Bo Black, Storm Scott, Jake Coons, Graeson Dall) 1:39.4.

Distance medley – 1. Marion 3:37.95; 5. Solon (Spencer Wegmann, Jack Bell, Trevor McGill, Carl Richey) 4:00.09.

Shuttle hurdle – 1. Mount Vernon 1:02.58; 3. Solon (Thomas Brandt, Bo Black, AJ Coons, Luke Ira) 1:03.56.

4×100 – 1. North Cedar 44.69; 4. Regina (Christian Iben, Brady Bigley, Jack Jensen, Jayden Kies) 45.45.

4×200 – 1. Vinton-Shellsburg 1:32.2; 5. Solon (Kendrick Harris, Storm Scott, Austin Kennedy, Jake Coons) 1:37.27.

4×400 – 1. Mount Vernon 3:27.88; 6. Solon (Kendrick Harris, Ryan Geistkemper, Trevor McGill, Austin Kennedy) 3:46.69.

4×800 – 1. Mount Vernon 8:37.22.

High jump – 1. Jackson Bennett (DB) 6-6; 3. AJ Coons (SOL) 5-10;

Long jump – 1. Blair Brooks (MAR) 22-2; 4. Luke Ira (SOL) 20-4 ¾.

Shot put – 1. Tristan Wirfs (MV) 64-7 ¼; 2. Jared Brinkman (ICR) 61-4 ½; 3. Tyler Linderbaum (SOL) 55-4 ¼; 5. Coal Flansburg (SOL) 51-9 ¼.

Discus – 1. Tristan Wirfs (MV) 195-2; 2. Jared Brinkman (ICR) 161-5; 4. Jackson Walker (SOL) 153-9; 5. Tyler Linderbaum (SOL) 141-0.