More than half of the 2019 Waukon girls track team has letterwinning experience

The Waukon girls track team has had 42 young ladies report for early-season duty to begin its 2019 campaign, with more than half of this season’s squad made up of varsity letterwinners returning from last spring’s squad. Among those 22 veterans are five of six Lady Indians who competed at every high school track and field athlete’s ultimate destination last season, the State Meet.

Those five returning State Meet qualifiers are all still underclassmen this spring, as junior Ellec Armstead returns as a high jump State qualifier and sophomore Annika Headington will bring back State shot put experience from her initial varsity season last spring, both of those young ladies finishing in the top 15 of Class 2A’s elite in their respective field events. Another trio of sophomores, Regan Griffith, Bailey Shafer and Maddy Waters, will also return from last season’s State-qualifying 4x800 crew, which will be missing graduated senior Lauren Elliott this season, as she was one of just four seniors to graduate from last spring’s squad.

That senior count will double this year and include all eight as returning letterwinners in Lauryn Behrend, Brigid Berns, Zaida Bockman, Nicole Campbell, Lauren Griffith, Megan O’Neill, Sydney Ross and Brooke Wasson. Six members of this year’s junior class will also all return as letterwinners, including Armstead, Katelyn Benzing, Leah Bulman, Madelyn Marti, Hailey Regan and Alison Sherman. Joining Headington, Regan Griffith, Shafer and Waters to round out this season’s list of returning veterans will be fellow sophomores Maya Bossom, Olivia Byrnes, Skylar Garrett and Ella Hermeier.

“We have eight seniors out and five of our six State Meet participants returning from last year’s squad, and I look for them to set good examples for the younger runners,” Waukon girls track coach Bob Wasson said. “I think that a number of girls can build upon the success that they had last year and they should be able to help the others improve also.”

Within that returning veteran core lies a group of distance athletes who also bring State Meet experience from this past fall’s cross country season, many of them having competed at that ultimate level for each of the last two seasons. O’Neill, Armstead, Benzing, Regan Griffith, Shafer, Waters and freshman Madelyn Helgerson helped the cross country Indians to an 11th-place team finish among Class 2A’s distance elite this past fall and will bring that experience to a diverse number of events this spring to further add to that high-level competition experience also leading this season’s track squad.

“We return five out of the six State meet participants from last year, as well as our entire shuttle hurdle relay team,” Coach Wasson said. “I look for us to maintain our competitiveness in many of our field events, as well as the 4x800 and the shuttle hurdle relay. I have a nice group of young sprinters that I am hoping will help to improve our sprint events. I think that our middle distance and distance events will also be much improved.”

This season’s freshman class will bring the largest amount of competitors to the 2019 Lady Indian track and field squad, as 14 of those first-year varsity eligible young ladies will be added to this season’s mix of veterans. “We are still a very young team, with a lot of girls that have not had a lot of varsity competition under their belts,” Coach Wasson reasoned. “It is still too early to tell, but I believe that we have added six or seven girls that will have an immediate impact upon the team.”

No matter the mix of veterans or newcomers, Coach Wasson has a series of goals in mind for this season’s squad. “I would like to have more events qualify for the State Meet, finish higher in the Conference standings, and maybe break a school record,” he shared.

In order to achieve those goals, Coach Wasson knows certain things have to fall into place, and remain there. “First and foremost, we need for the weather to cooperate and the snow to melt so that we can start running on our track,” he said. “The girls will have to work hard and improve from last year and, of course, we will need to stay healthy and injury free.”

Chasing perennial power Decorah at a good number of their meets this season will help fuel the Lady Indians toward those goals, as Coach Wasson sees the Vikings as this season’s Northeast Iowa Conference (NEIC) favorite once again. “Decorah will be the favorites again this year,” he speculated. “But, after that, I am not sure how the rest of the teams will finish.”

The Indians were slated to get an early taste of this season’s conference competition at the annual NEIC Indoor Meet scheduled for Tuesday, March 19 at Wartburg College in Waverly. The Tribe is then scheduled to head outdoors March 26 at the Frostbite Invitational hosted by Sumner-Fredericksburg.

“I feel that we have a very strong core group of runners returning from last year and we have a number of new participants that I feel will be able to make an immediate impact,” Coach Wasson summarized. “I am looking forward to getting on the track and seeing how we compare with other area schools.”