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By Arnie Leshin
He’s officially the new head track and field coach at Santa Fe Prep, but Douglas Turco is happy to have the assistance of the old coach as he takes over yet another quality Griffin program.
Number one, Tove Shere, one of the state’s finest coaches and a triathlon standout to brag, has assured Turco she will spend her final season as his assistant coach.
Shere’s girls won state 3A last year, state 3A in 2015, state 2A in 2011, and state 2A in 2006.
“It’s great to have Tove around,” Turco said, “she is a state championship coach and full of energy and knowledge.”
And this past Saturday, Turco rang out with Believe in Blue as both his girls and boys each finished second in the team scoring at the Route 66 Classic’s Gallup Invitational.
Junior Hayden Colfax, a state champion in her fourth year on the team, is again off to a stellar start as her versatility improves each time out. This time, she again sped a state-qualifying time of 13:03 in winning the 100 meters.
Next, she also handled the 110 hurdles in fine form and qualified for state again with a winning time, school record 15:23. Then she headed over to the high jump and continued to win and soar over in the state qualifying height of 5-4, which was also a school record.
Why quit now. Aren’t records made to be broken? So she lined up for the 200 meters and dashed to a winning state qualifying time of 27:09. One moretime she added a first place in anchoring the 4 x 400 relay team that clocked 4:27 and included sophomore Luz Thunder, Lincoln and Griscom.
No state qualifying time here, but it did bring her a perfecto 5-for-5 day. She qualified in four events and wiped out a pair of school records.
Senior Taylor Lincoln took third in the 100, 200, and ran second leg on the victorious relay team. A second place went to sophomore Chelsea Griscom in the 800 in the time of 2:38.6, and sophomore Raclyn Gonzales picked up a third place when she went 27’ 25” in the triple jump.
In the 4 x 100 stick-pass, Gonzales dashed the lead leg and Griscom the third in the third place time of 55:12. Freshman Sophie Addison did the second leg and on the anchor was Isabel “Izzy” Ungard. Ungard was also runner-up in the long jump with a best of 13-9, and Gonzales placed third.
Not to forget the Griffin boys, senior Sam Sparks paved the way with state-qualifying efforts in winning the high jump at 6-2, the 200 meters in 23:07, and also topped the field in the 100 meters with a best of 20’3.5.
Prep also won the 4 x 400 relay with Sparks handling the second leg, senior Sean Coles leading off, freshman Joshua Abeyta doing the third leg, and sophomore anchor Samuel Cooper crossing the finish in 3:50. Coles was the runner-up in the triple jump by going 39’7.5”.
The Griffins had others that did well, but here you have their first three in every event. As Turco pointed out, Believe in Blue.
