For the third straight year, Hampton-Dumont-CAL senior Charlee Morton won the Drake Relays Girls Shot Put championship Friday inside Drake Stadium.
The competition was tight, and there were several lead changes. Lauren Travis of Spirit Lake took the lead with a season-high 45-06 on her fifth throw, putting Morton into third place. But Morton quickly took the lead back with a heave of 46-03.50 on her next attempt. On the final attempt, she blasted a 46-09.25, tying the program record and solidifying the title.
“I thrive under that competition,” Morton says. “So I was honestly glad that someone threw that big mark in the finals, just so it would give me a little more motivation to throw farther. And right when she threw that, I knew I could throw that far as well. And just that motivation and competition, it’s great when the competitions are like that because it makes it so much more fun.”
The win came a day after Morton placed second in the discus. She finishes her high school Drake Relays career with five championships and one runner-up in the throwing events.
Iowa Falls-Alden sophomore Izzy Janssen placed 25th in the 100-meter hurdles prelim in 15.63.
“I think it was good, I think it could have gone a little better, but there was a lot of really good competition,” Janssen says. “It’s been a really cool experience and it’s really cool that I have made it out here and hopefully make it back here.”
She’ll have a great chance to return for the state meet, holding the fifth-fastest time in Class 2A.
In the girls high jump, Grundy Center junior Allison Koch placed 10th by tying a season-best 5-04. She cleared 5-04 on her second attempt, but missed all three attempts at 5-06. She’s gained confidence through multiple appearances in Drake Stadium, having also qualified in her freshman year.
“I think freshman year, I was really just kind of scared to come down and compete, it can be slightly intimidating to be that young,” Koch says. “But this year after competing here at State as well and then my freshman year, a little more comfortable with that. So, I’m having a little more confidence in myself.”
Clarion-Goldfield-Dows senior MaKayla Beisel also competed, but didn’t clear the opening height.
Grundy Center junior Grace Storjohann placed 11th in the 800-meter run in a PR of 2:15.63. Having entered with the lowest-seeded time, she jumped five spots and recorded the best time in Class 2A so far this season.
“I told my coach, I was like, ‘Man, I’m not getting last,'” Storjohann says. “That’s my main goal, and that’s what I went out there for. And I achieved that and so much more. Going in, I knew there was only two girls from 2A and we were right next to each other. So this was a potentially like a state championship rivalry. So I knew I could stick with her, if I can win today, I can win state in the future. And it’s just crazy having this big of a comeback in a year. It’s amazing. I mean like, just less than a year ago, I was told I might never ever be able to run fast again. And that’s just a crazy difference. It shows how much hard work I’ve put in over the last nine months.”
To conclude the night, the Grundy Center boys 4×400 group of Brayden Davie, Brayden Wallis, Brody Zinkula and Judd Jirovsky were outside qualifying for the finals by placing 10th, but set a new program record of 3:20.46. Zinkula says the job isn’t finished.
“We’ve got to improve,” Zinkula says. “I mean we broke the school record, but we just saw Okoboji and Denver are ahead of us, so we’ve just got to improv so we can get that state championship at the end.”
With five of the top 15 times in Class 2A coming from the NICL, Jirovsky says iron will sharpen iron throughout the last month of the season.
“It’s definitely beneficial to see good quality teams at every meet,” Jirovsky says. “Just keep getting better. And we know that from other sports or from track that we’re ready to compete and I’ll always take these guys over anybody else.”
It was also the program’s first Drake Relays appearance since Logan Knaack competed in the 100-meter dash in 2021.
