Lake Park looking good again

As Lake Park boys track coach Jay Ivory wrote in his weekly newsletter, things are looking up for the Lancers.

Discus thrower Mike Prestigiacomo had people looking up and far away Saturday at Downers Grove South's Bud Mohns Invitational. Setting a meet record, the returning Class 3A fifth-place discus thrower launched one 191 feet, 10 inches. In Prestigiacomo's first outdoor invite this season on April 11, he won the top level at Wheaton North's Best 4 at 179-8.

Lake Park's own Dan Block holds the longest Illinois mark measured, 208-11 at the 2009 Class 3A Lake Park sectional.

Waubonsie throws coach Roger Einbecker and Fremd coach and throws specialist Jim Aikens offer a website, Illinois Throws Association, listing the top performances in boys and girls discus and shot put. Athletes such as Block and Einbecker's own son, Waubonsie Valley grad Brett Einbecker (No. 6 in disc at 197-6½) threw several long marks while in high school, but only their top distance is noted.

Prestigiacomo ranks 15th all-time in Illinois with his throw at the Bud Mohns meet, 1 inch farther than Lake Park's Jason Pankau, 191-9 in 1988. It was the longest throw since Grant's Brandon Lombardino went 201-7 on May 9, 2013.

Along with Chago Basso's Bud Mohns sophomore meet record of 175-2 in discus, hurdles superstar Antonio Shenault's return also heartened the Lancers.

Back from an ankle injury sustained away from the track, the defending Class 3A 110-meter hurdles champion ran the fastest preliminary time, 14.64 seconds, and nearly duplicated that to win the finals in 14.65. Shenault, a Minnesota football recruit, placed sixth in the 300 hurdles and anchored a winning 400 relay.

Incidentally:

Brett Einbecker is the interim co-head coach for the men's and women's track programs at Missouri Valley College in Marshall, Missouri. A graduate assistant, he originally went there as a throws coach but the spot opened up. Einbecker seeks to finish his master's degree, and once that happens there's a good chance he could take sole leadership of the program.

Plowman in Kansas:

Regardless of Lake Park's success at Downers South, York eked out the team win 109 points to 105. The Dukes, under first-year coach Charlie Kern, did it without one of their top stars.

Senior Matt Plowman competed Friday at the 88th annual Kansas Relays in Lawrence. Running the 1,600 meters Plowman went 4 minutes, 11.43 seconds, setting a meet record for high school boys and recording Illinois' fastest time on the Dyestat board this season.

That earned Plowman not only an invitation to the Adidas Dream Mile in New York City on June 13 but also recognition by meet officials as male performer of the meet.

Sheer numbers:

Gus Scott, the retired Naperville North coach and namesake of the annual Gus Scott Invitational, was there last Friday. He usually is.

"You couldn't ask for a better night for a track meet," he said of the weather.

It worked well for the Huskies girls distance runners. Three of them broke 6 minutes in the open-division, nonscoring 1,600 to total 28 Naperville North girls out of a target of 30 to have run the distance in less than six minutes.

The rest of the meet is conducted on A-B-C levels, but Naperville North's 3,200-meter girls all ran at A-pace.

Operating as a lead pack, sophomore Claire Hamilton, freshman Sarah Schmitt and senior Emily Hamilton, Claire's sister, owned no less than a 45-second margin over the runner-up on their respective level. At 11 minutes, 5.63 seconds Emily Hamilton ran 1 minute, 31 seconds ahead of the next runner in her level.

"They ran exactly what we set out for them to run," said Naperville North girls distance coach Dan Iverson, who runs one of Illinois' most consistent distance programs, as does Dave Racey on the Huskies' boys side.

With all this talent - including Judy Pendergast, who ran the 1,600 in 4:56.53 - one might think there would be pressure to find a slot. Claire Hamilton, a sophomore, did not think so.

"(It) just motivates the rest of the team to do what we can obviously do," she said. "It's just everyone pushing each other, so I really don't feel it's any pressure at all."