Exploding out of the gates
Two Gryphons qualify for nationals in first track and field event of the season
Mike Treadgold

"Usually you don't have your best performances until late February and early March. To come out of the gate and hit standard right off the bat is exceptional." – track and field head coach Dave Scott-Thomas on the early successes of his team.

 

In honour of their late, great coach, the Guelph Gryphons track and field season is underway.

The 2nd Annual Zoltan Tenke Field Classic took place in the Gryphon Dome on Friday afternoon. The event's namesake honoured the Gryphons' late track and field coach who passed away last December at age 81, just before the team hosted the inaugural event in his name.

"He was just an awesome guy and he had been here with me ever since we started building up that whole end of our program," said head coach Dave Scott-Thomas. "Fortunately, he lived to see our first two (national championship) banners," he added, referring to the Gryphons' dual CIS championship titles that were won during the 2007-08 season.

"Because of the success of our distance groups in cross-country, it's been a challenge to culturally get across that we're really good in track and field as well," said Scott-Thomas. "Our women were second in the country last year and the men were third. And the year before that, we were national champions."

The Gryphons' season-opening meet featured only field events, due to the indoor track in the dome not meeting national qualifying standards. As such, the Gryphon team took part in all of the jumping and throwing events, with the exception of pole vault, which did not take place.

Despite the small size of the meet, the events were a great success for the Gryphons. Two athletes, Dustin McCrank and Tim Hendry, achieved the CIS standard in weight throw and shotput, respectively, automatically qualifying them for the national championships in March.

The CIS standard accomplishment is based on the average of the top six best performances in that event from the past three years. There are usually no more than four to six athletes that achieve the standard accomplishment throughout the season.

"The standards are quite difficult to get and it's highly unusual to get standards before January, because that's when you're peaking," said Scott-Thomas. "Usually you don't have your best performances until late February and early March. To come out of the gate and hit standard right off the bat is exceptional."

High jumper Mike Lopatowski just missed achieving the standard in his event, a level he is expected to reach later in the season.

Standard-achieving athletes, conference champions, and the silver medalists from the CanWest and OUA championships all automatically qualify for nationals. The league intends for 12 athletes to take place in each event at nationals. In the case of a tie, which frequently occurs in many jumping events, all tied athletes qualify for nationals, which could then see the player pool exceed 12 participants.

With an incredibly talented team, Scott-Thomas anticipates a healthy Gryphon contingent at nationals.

"With all due respect to our teams that won two national titles two years ago, these are our best teams ever," said Scott-Thomas. "We're a deeper team than we were then, but we're also younger. We're going to be asking some 18-year-olds to be 'high-end CIS-good.'

"We have an exceptional group of rookies. They're exceptional in terms of talent, but I've also never seen a group of first-year (athletes) come in with this kind of hungry attitude, collectively."

With a rookie group of no fewer than 30 incoming athletes, Scott-Thomas did not hesitate to name this year's recruiting class the best in Gryphon history.

"We're going to take a run at a title, and the exciting thing is that as good as we are right now, I expect we'll be stronger next year."

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