Month: May 2011

It is always nice when the Boston Globe writes the sports.priorfamily.org entry:

The girls’ competition was much tighter, with a great showing in the field events proving the difference for Newton North, which finished with 93 1/2 points, 8 more than Andover.

The Tigers earned 24 points in the long jump on strong performances by Carla Forbes (first, 17 feet 5 3/4 inches), Kayla Wong (second, 16-9 1/2), and Kayla Prior (fifth, 16- 1/4). They added 18 points in the discus as Ellen Goldberg (114-1) and Tatiana Froehlich (112-3) went 1-2.

“Getting the big points in the long jump and discus gives us a big shot in the arm,’’ said coach Joe Tranchita. “Execution was the key and that really was the focus. We weren’t looking at points, we weren’t looking at matchups.’’

Kayla completed her 2011 track season with a 16′ 1/4″ long jump for 5th place and 4 points in the Division 1 championships on Saturday in Andover. Together the Newton North long jumpers placed 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 7th, to contribute 24 points to Newton’s 93.5 to 87.5 win over Andover and the other 32 scoring schools in the meet (photos, results, Boston Globe article, Boston Herald article, Newton Track Blog, Newton Tab article, Newton tab photos) .

As the Boston Globe notes above, the long jump was one of the 1st events completed and having the Newton jumpers exceed their already high expectations based on incoming seeds by 3 points set the meet’s momentum in Newton’s favor. The 31 other largest eastern Mass schools could only field 2 athletes to beat her. This was Kayla’s first trip to a state meet medal podium. Her 4 points ranked her as Newton’s 7th highest point scorer for the day and enabled Newton to enter the final 4x400m relay with a tie for the win locked up. She also ran the 100m for 17th in 13.48a.

From the Boston Globe today:

Photo from Andrea Keklak’s (800m record setter) dad. I work with her mom.

Kayla ran a personal best 13.24 FAT (equivalent to 13.0 hand time) in the 100m dash at the South Shore Principal’s meet Saturday ( Newton tab article, results, photos, jump sequences ). She placed 5th place [see race sequence), improving from 17th seed in the 30 entrant field. She qualified for the division 1 state championships next week (Saturday, Andover HS, 9:30AM), where she should be 13th seed or better (performance lists link). She has also qualified for D1 state meet in the long jump. Kayla also scored in the triple jump in the meet with a 31’1″ jump for 5th place and a total of 4 points toward Newton 130.33 win over runner up Brockton (68).

Kayla’s now ranks #2 in 100m at Newton North behind Carla Forbes so she may play a role on 4x100m next week as well. The 100m mark improved her seasonal best by 0.5 second and personal best by 0.2.

Kayla earned her first individual event championship medal of her high school career with a 5th place in the long jump at the 12 school Bay State Conference Championship on Wednesday (Newton Tab article, results on cool running, results on athletics.net). Kayla jumped 15’10.25″ on a cold and rainy day that had most competitors jumping 2 feet behind their personal bests. She now ranks 21st out of 593 competitors in the state.