For some sort of an idea as to just how special the San Benito
boys’ track and field team could be this year, look no further than
the fact that it will be traveling south this weekend to the
Arcadia Invitational. For the unaware, Arcadia is the largest track
meet in California that isn’t the state championships, although its
scope is far more wide-reaching, and simply qualifying for it is by
no means an easy feat.
HOLLISTER
For some sort of an idea as to just how special the San Benito boys’ track and field team could be this year, look no further than the fact that it will be traveling south this weekend to the Arcadia Invitational.
For the unaware, Arcadia is the largest track meet in California that isn’t the state championships, although its scope is far more wide-reaching, and simply qualifying for it is by no means an easy feat.
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While an individual or two from San Benito has qualified to the exclusive meet in years past, which attracts some of the top track athletes in the country and the world, it’s been six years since the Balers have had enough qualifiers to make the nearly six-hour trip south worthwhile.
“It’s special years like this that you want to make the monetary commitment,” said San Benito boys’ coach Iran White, who noticed two years ago this would be an “Arcadia year.”
“You see the group coming up,” he added. “You know how hard they work. You know what their ceiling is gonna be.”
Even then, it still might have been a little difficult to discern just how good the Balers have been this season.
Take, for instance, those who will be attending the Los Angeles-based meet this Friday and Saturday.
The 4×400 relay team recorded a 3:21.78 at the Stanford Invitational two weeks ago, the fifth fastest time recorded in the state this season, and sit just four one-hundredths of a second off the school record.
The 4×800 relay team recorded an 8:01.48 at the Stanford Invitational two weeks ago, the sixth fastest time recorded in the state this season, and shattered the previous school record by roughly 12 seconds.
The 800 Sprint Medley relay, meanwhile, in its one and only try this season, recorded a 1:35.68 at the Garlic Classic in Gilroy last month, the fastest time recorded in the state this season.
“We’ve got a good group of guys and we’re looking forward to Friday night,” said Baler Michael Bocksnick, who runs one of the two 100-meter dashes in the 800 Sprint Medley. While Zack Nitzel runs the other 100-meter leg, the relay race also includes a 200-meter leg, run by Scott Medina, and a 400-meter leg, run by Jason Roascio.
“Hopefully, we can all PR in our splits,” Bocksnick added.
Surprisingly, despite owning the top time in California, San Benito’s preparation for the Sprint Medley wasn’t exactly extensive, considering the relay doesn’t take place at every invitational — very few, in fact.
“It was kind of spur of the moment,” Bocksnick said of the team’s preparation. “We practiced our hand-offs like five minutes before the race.”
Good enough. The team’s top time stands all of 14 one-hundredths of a second faster than the Southern Section’s Paramount High (1:35.82).
“It was a very pleasant fulfillment of what I had hoped for,” White said. “I’m not surprised, but it’s one of those things that could very easily not have happened.”
The big surprise was perhaps the time of the 4×800 relay team. Made up of Steven Hernandez, David Kret, Jose Castillo and Said Hernandez, the middle-distance foursome not only recorded a time worthy enough of qualifying to Arcadia, not only recorded a time that placed them sixth overall in California, but set a no-doubt-about-it school record — some 12 seconds faster than the previous mark.
“At Stanford, they showed up,” White said. “With that performance, they said, ‘Yeah, we want to go (to Arcadia).'”
Kret said the team knew what the school record was during the race two weeks ago, after last season’s performance at Stanford didn’t quite live up to expectations.
A year ago, the team was on its way to breaking the school record at the Palo Alto meet when it was disqualified for crossing the finish line without the baton.
“I was definitely thinking about it again, but I wasn’t going to let it happen again,” Kret said.
Meanwhile, it seems like only a matter of time before the 4×400 relay team breaks the school record. The team’s bread and butter of the last several seasons, San Benito’s 1,600-meter relay clocked a 3:23.36 at the K-Bell Invitational on March 12, which at that point was the fastest time in the Central Coast Section. It then shaved the time down to a 3:21.78 two weeks later at Stanford.
While it’s the fifth fastest time in the state this year, San Benito’s 3:21.78 is also the fastest in the CCS by nearly seven seconds.
“They’ll get it. Hopefully at Arcadia,” White said of the relay team, which is made up of Medina, Roascio, Kret and Taylor Lothman.
“I feel like this weekend at Arcadia, we can definitely get it,” Lothman added of the school record, a 3:21.74. “.04 seconds isn’t that much. If we just push ourselves, we can reach that goal.”
With the amount of elite talent that will be present at Arcadia this weekend, there perhaps won’t be a better time to cut a few additional one-hundredths of a second off. And with the team’s desire to travel to the national championships this year as well, Arcadia is also the perfect place to make a statement.
“We know it’s a big meet and it’s a chance to get our times lower,” Roascio said. “That’s what we’re looking forward to.”
Roascio is the only current member of the 4×400 relay who was part of setting that school-record time in 2009. He’ll also compete at Arcadia in the 200-meter dash, for which he qualified for after recording a time of 22.06 seconds (NWI) at the K-Bell Invitational, the eighth-fastest wind-aided time in the state this year.
Scott Medina will also be competing in an individual event — the 300-meter hurdles. He clocked a time of 38.67 seconds in the event last weekend at the St. Francis Invitational in Mountain View, a new school record by a little more than a second, and the third fastest recorded time in the state this season.
Medina suffered a broken foot at the tail end of last season, which kept him out for the larger postseason meets, including the Central Coast Section Championships. But Friday and Saturday’s trip to Arcadia, which is said to be home to 25 national records, may just make up for it.
“You always feel the extra pressure for bigger meets,” Medina said. “But it’s just another day on the track.”
Arcadia Invitational, Arcadia High School
Friday, April 8
4×800 — 5:10 p.m.
Steven Hernandez, David Kret, Jose Castillo, Said Hernandez
800 Sprint Medley — 6:30 p.m.
Michael Bocksnick, Zack Nitzel, Scott Medina, Jason Roascio
Saturday, April 9
300-meter hurdles — 1:41 p.m.
Scott Medina
200 meters — 3 p.m.
Jason Roascio
4×400 — 3:57 p.m.
David Kret, Taylor Lothman, Scott Medina, Jason Roascio
