Illinois Best in 400 Meter Dash for Brandon Battle at Gately Park

Top Five United States performances from Rogers, Shoaf, and Schlenker in Illinois Meet of Champions

By Michael Newman

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Chicago – The one thing that Brandon Battle of Edwardsville wanted to achieve at the two-day Illinois Meet of Champions was to set a new standard for Illinois High School athletes in the 400 Meter Dash. The senior did just that running a US #5 47.87 to establish a new Illinois indoor best indoors Saturday afternoon.

FRIDAY RESULTS | SATURDAY RESULTS | INTERVIEWS

Battle made it look easy in the three-runner final section of the event. Battle had no competition ahead of him as he started out in Lane 5 with no one to pace himself off in the outside lane. That did not matter. He had a clear lead at the break line and ran the perfect tangent to the end of a 22.2 first 200-meters.

That was it for Battle as he made his way around the second circuit of the track. He came off the final turn with his eyes looking at this time on the scoreboard.

“I heard the announcer calling out the time as I came down the stretch,” Battle said. “I knew I was going to get it.”

Niko Schutz of Plainfield South ran second at the same time achieving a new personal best of 49.23 seconds.

Battle came back at the end of the meet to secure his second win of the afternoon running 21.76 to win the 200 Meter Dash. His closest competition came from Kyle Burgoni of Tolono Unity who was almost a full second behind Battle at 22.52 seconds.

“My goal coming into this meet was going under 48 seconds,” Battle added. “There was no one to chase after in Lane 6. I just wanted to get to the pole position first.”

The Gately Park Indoor Track Complex is earning the reputation of being a place where great distance times can be achieved. It was again the case this weekend as some fast times were clicked off on this fast track.

Drew Rogers of Herscher IL set the tone for the distance races in this meet with a spectacular 3200 Meter Run on Friday afternoon. The junior was like a human metronome hitting his proposed lap times on the beat. It necessary since he had the fastest seed time in his section by more than 20 seconds.

Rogers took the lead on the first lap clocking 32.1 seconds. His final two laps were 33.4 and 29.9. In between he was more than consistant clocking 34 second laps on his way to a US #4 9:02.08 win by 18 seconds ahead of Naperville North’s Tommy Paltzer (9:20.49).

“After two weeks of good hard mileage, I definitely knew I was going to be fit for this race,” Rogers said. “I wanted to break nine-minutes. I knew it was going to be tough. I knew there was going to be a good field, but I knew I would have to do this solo. I was happy on how I performed.

Drew Rogers Splits: 32.1, 66.6 (34.5), 1:41.1 (34.5), 2:15.5 (34.4), 2:49.9 (34.4), 3:24.6 (34.7), 3:59.0 (34.4), 4:33.1 (34.1), 5:07.1 (34.0), 5:41.2 (34.1), 6:15.5 (34.3), 6:49.9 (34.4), 7:24.3 (34.4), 7:58.8 (34.5), 8:32.2 (33.4), 9:02.08 (29.9).

Kaylie Politza of Valparaiso IN came into the adidas Indoor Nationals last week with a personal best indoors of 2:17. She lowered that in Virginia down to 2:12. It was lowered on Friday night after she ran 2:10.56 (US #7) to win the 800 Meter Run.

She had help to push her to this time. Politza took the lead early but had Ava Parekh of Latin School, the 1 Mile National Champ, right on her side. The two runners passed 400-meters at 63.2 and 600-meters at 1:36.8. On the final back stretch, the Valpo junior released her speed pulling away from Parekh.

“My coach and I decided before the race that we were going to run this like it was a 600-meter race,” Politza said afterwards. “The final 200-meters I was going to find out what I had.” She closed the race in a final 33.7 for 200-meters.

Wilson Georges of Bartonville Limestone had been noticeably absent from the past two meets at this venue. He had a reason.

“I was supposed to run the 1600 the first weekend of February and the 3200 two weeks later. I tested positive for COVID-19 on February 1,” Georges explained. “I had to take some time off because I was not feeling that good. I still do not have my taste or smell back.”

Georges was confident heading into this meet running a solo 1:56 time trial for 800-meters at Illinois State last Saturday. It showed in his racing taking the lead in this 1600 Meter Run race just after a 61.6 opening 400-meters.

The junior controlled the race from there with Hunter Jones of Benzie Central MI, Matthew Griffin of New England Track Elite Club, and Gavin Genisio of Benton trying to stay with the pace. Georges kept pushing the lead issue going through 800-meters in 2:06.7, 1200-meters in 3:11.2, and then closing in 62.9 to capture the win in an US#7 4:14.08 time. Griffin was next (4:17.21) followed by the freshman Genisio (4:18.80) who finished fourth overall. Tim Neumann of Downers Grove South ran 4:18.48 to win the opening sectional also finishing third overall.

“I am so glad I came out here to run on this awesome indoor track,” commented Georges. “It is finally great to have a track like this in Illinois.”

Benton’s Gavin Genisio is showing why he could be the next great distance runner in Illinois especially from his performances during this indoor season. Genisio’s 1600-meter performance came after he ran 1:58.75 to win the 800 Meter Run Friday night ahead of Evan Finger of Dodgeland WI (2:00.38).

Katrina Schlenker of Batavia IL has raced twice indoors off base work this season. Her latest performance in Friday’s 3200 Meter Run was evident that this junior is ready for a great outdoor track season. The battle in the final four laps of the race came from lead runner Rachel Forsyth of Ann Arbor Pioneer MI and Schlenker.

“I made some moves to test her (Forsyth) and see how she would react,” Schlenker said. “I learned from that so many times this cross-country season racing against Sam Poglitsch and changing my strategy up in the middle of the race.”

In the final laps of this race, Schlenker made moves on the outside with Forsyth refusing to let the Batavia junior pass. Her move with 150-meters left was definitive opening more than seven seconds to the finish line. Schlenker finished with a personal best 10:31.81 (US #4) for the win. The freshman Forsyth was under 10:40 running 10:38.10 (US #8) in finishing second.

Forsyth came back on Saturday afternoon in the Girls 1600 Meter Run. She waited to take the lead until the final lap for the win (4:57.79) just holding off Allison Chmielewski of Roscommon MI (4:57.94) by fifteen hundredths of a second.

Other Meet Highlights

CJ Shoaf of Mahomet-Seymour turned in one of the top field event performances of this meet winning the Boys High Jump clearing 6-10 (US #3) on his second attempt. Shoaf entered the competition at 6-6 after the rest of the field had exhausted their attempts.

Riley Ammenhauser of Neuqua Valley HS had a great Saturday winning both horizontal jumps events. She started by jumping 19-0 on her third of four attempts to win the Long Jump. Ammenhauser shut the door in the Triple Jump with a 41-0.25 attempt on her first jump. Bria Armstrong of Bloom Township IL was her closest competition jumping 36-11.75 to finish second.

Windsor Roberts of Tri-Valley achieved a seasonal best in the Girls Pole Vault Friday night. She cleared 13-1.5 on her third attempt at the height to claim the event win.

Kyle Clabough of Yorkville fouled on three of his six attempts in the Boys Shot Put Friday night. His third attempt with a 55-3 put gave him the event win.

Katharine Duren of New England Elite Track Club was dominant in her two event wins on Saturday. The senior had a great start in the finals of the 60 Meter Hurdles as she ran 8.50 (US #7) for the win. Duren came back at the end of the meet to run 25.43 to win the 200 Meter Dash.

Seven hundredths of a second separated the top five runners in the 60 Meter Dash finals. Kyle Burgoni of Tolono Unity nipped Sean Hopkins of Glenbard West by one hundredth of a second to claim the win. Burgoni was timed at 7.01 seconds. Max Rivera of Neuqua Valley (7.04), Caleb Lerus of Lycée Francais de Chicago (7.06), and Tyler Mack of TF South (7.08) finished third through fifth.

Sydney Weaver of Chicago Kenwood ran a seasonal best of 7.83 to win the Girls 60 Meter Dash ahead of second-place Dominque Thomas of Danville (7.98).