I.E. sending 22 hurdlers to CIF finals
As the postseason wears on for the track athletes who continue to qualify at each increasingly difficult meet, there is a specific group in the Inland Empire that has cleared the most hurdles. The hurdlers.
After qualifying in their respective league meets and hitting the mark in last week's CIF-SS preliminaries, the I.E. is sending 22 hurdlers to the CIF-SS Finals meet today at Cerritos College. The competitors in the girls 100-meter hurdle races today will be particularly familiar with one another as hurdlers from the Inland Empire are responsible for four of the top 10 times in the state this year.
Rancho Cucamonga's Jordie Munford braved a battle with food poisoning last week, though it was hard to tell given that she qualified second in the 100 hurdles and third in the 300 hurdles at the Division I preliminaries. The sophomore posted the state's second-fastest time in the 300 hurdles when she ran the race in 41.96 seconds April 8 at the Arcadia Invitational. She has the state's third-fastest time in the 100 hurdles, a 13.96-second mark from the Inland Empire Championships April 23.
Joining Munford with top-nine times in the 100 hurdles are No. 5, San Dimas senior Katherine Salcido, who qualified first at the Division 3 prelims.
No. 6 is Ayala senior Brea Buchanan, who qualified third in the 100 hurdles and first in the 100 meters at the Division 2 prelims. Buchanan finished third in the 100 hurdles at last year's CIF finals.
No. 9 is Carter senior Shanice Stewart, who posted the top time at the D2 prelims in addition to qualifying in the long jump, high jump and as a member of Carter's 400-meter relay team.
Los Osos junior Ifeoma Onumonu posted the seventh-fastest 300-hurdle time in the state this season when she qualified second ahead of Munford in 43.51 seconds at the D1 prelims last week.
The boys hurdlers are led by Summit's Devon Blackmon, the top qualifier in the 110 high hurdles at the Division 1 meet who is a two-time veteran of the state meet.
Andrew Fischer of Diamond Ranch posted the state's second-fastest time in the 300 hurdles on April 15 at the Mt. SAC relays and qualified fourth in the event at the Division 3 prelims.
As professed at the D2 prelims last Saturday by Colony coach Jaime Sandoval, who is sending competitors in 11 events to CIF finals, simply qualifying is no longer the goal.
"(At CIF finals) they've got to put it on the track," Sandoval said, "and leave it all out there."
Competitors will be competing to advance to next week's CIF Masters meet, the final hurdle to the state meet, but they'll be hoping to do it with a CIF-SS championship in tow.
About Clay
Clay Fowler has been covering high school sports for six years in California and Texas. He was born in Dallas, attended the University of Texas and worked in Central Texas before joining the Daily Bulletin staff in 2006.
Email Clay here
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