Barrington wins boys Lake County Invitational; Warren's relay team sets record
With a huge 21-team field for the Lake County Invitational, it was going to take a lot of depth to bring home the championship trophy of this powerful boys track meet Thursday night at Lake Zurich.
From the early stages, one could tell it was shaping up to be a four-team battle for first place between Barrington, Grayslake Central, Warren and Grayslake North.
In the end, the Broncos edged Grayslake Central 73.83 to 72 for the title, while the Blue Devils were third with 71 points. Grayslake North (66.5) was fourth and the host Bears (53) sixth.
While Barrington used a total team effort to claim the crown, Warren's 4x800-meter relay team really set the tone early as Luke Wiley, Caleb Levy, Maxwell Zeisler and Kimi Vesely set a Lake County meet record with a blazing time of 7:51.42.
Warren's 4x100-meter relay team of Aaron Ayobami, Jose Lim, Charley Thompson and Jailen Duffie also took first place at 43.92.
Lake Zurich got some great distance running from Danny Burns as he won the 3,200-meter run in 9:40.88. Teammate Ben Cooper was the 110-meter high hurdles champion in 15.51, and the 300-meter low hurdles champ in 40.52.
"Ben Cooper is one of the toughest kids on the team, and that showed in both hurdles," said Lake Zurich coach Randal Dunbar. "It's always a great meet at Lake County. This meet is all about getting the top guys together."
Other winners were Stevenson's Jimmy Davis (50.49) in the 400-meter dash, and Wiley (4:22.10) in the 1,600-meter run
Barrington got seconds from Ryan Fryer in the 3,200-meter run, Connor Lee in the 100-meter dash, and Joey Furlong in the 800-meter run.
"We had a rough week last week and we're missing some good kids, but I'm really happy with the way we competed," said Barrington coach Todd Kuklinski, whose team easily toppled defending Lake County champions Deerfield in fifth place. "It's a great field for Lake County track. That was our record (4x800) from 2011 that Warren beat so good for them."
Warren coach Josh Williams was ecstatic about the performance of his relay teams.
"It's a special group of guys, and we were really excited about coming here trying to break that record," Williams said. "That was the first time that group of four (4x100) ran together and they all ran very well."
Grayslake North's 4x200 relay team of Tristan Ramsey, Zach Weitgenant, Deandre Neely and Connor Johnson posted a winning mark of 1:31.40. The Knights' 4x400 relay team also brought home first place in 3:30.
In the field events, Vernon Hills' David Mun won discus with a throw of 49.64 meters, while Wauconda's Kosta Zografos took first in the high jump with a leap of 1.92 meters. Grayslake Central's Kaiden Miller won long jump (6.35 meters) and triple jump (13.1 meters). Lakes' Paul Migas (4.42 meters) won pole vault, and Barrington's Jose Mejia (16.20 meters) won shot put.