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BY CHUCH FITZER

The Wildcat boys and girls opened the season with an indoor meet against North Branch, Big Lake and Holy Angels at the University of Minnesota Fieldhouse Friday, March 30. No team scores were kept. Head coach Ken Orwoll liked what he saw. "Overall, both the boys and girls had good performances," said Orwoll. "Some of the young kids stepped up and really did well. I'm pretty excited about how this season is going to go."

Boys

The Wildcat sprinters took four of the first five spots in the 60-meter dash, with Christian Swanberg placing first. The Wildcat 4x200 relay team of Swanberg, Brian Jennissen, David Berget and Chris Golv came in first place. And freshman Josh Nielsen won the 200-meter dash as the Wildcats took three of the first four spots in that race. "Josh Nielson is going to do very well this year'" said Orwoll, "and he's only a freshmen. He's going to fit in well with our sprinting crew. Our sprinters will provide a lot of excitement this year.

Zach Hunter won the 800-meter run. Orwoll said "We can always count on Zach - the man with experience. It's good to see your seniors come out on top."

In field events, Golv took first in the high jump and second in the long jump. Taylor Lindeman won the shot put and Brad Reineccius and Dan Sandgren finished second and third, respectively, in the pole vault. "In field events we did a lot better than I expected," said Orwoll. "We had a lot of guys finish in the top eight. Sometimes those events are overlooked, but you can get a lot of points out of there. What's nice to see is this is taking place and we haven't really done much of this outside yet. Right down the line we did a great job in the field events."

Girls

The Wildcat girls had some nice performances to open the season, as well. The team of Shana Meath, Shannon Monson, Lindsay Fowler-Wacholz and Chelsea Johnson finished first in the 1600-meter medley relay. "We tried some different people in some of those spots," commented Orwoll. "and they really went after it. They went out to win and they did it. Kristin Tengwall ran well in the two relays and the opening 100. And Danielle Vitali was right there back at the top. She ran a very good time while finishing second in the 1600 meters, and also ran well to help our 4x800 relay team finish in second."

Brenna Coyle "is back in form already," said Orwoll. She won the shot put event with a winning throw that was nearly five feet longer than the throw of the second-place finisher. Fowler-Wacholz won the triple jump and finished fifth in the long jump. Sam Genung came in second in the long jump. Orwoll said "It's nice to have a couple of sophomores who are already jumping this well."

The meet scheduled for this past Tuesday, April 3 at Totino-Grace was postponed due to weather. The Wildcats' next meet is at 2:45 p.m. Tuesday, April 10 at Irondale against Irondale and North Branch.

North Branch Track

BY DAVE AMBERS

Sports editor

The North Branch track teams kicked off the season by running in an indoor meet hosted by Chisago Lakes at the University of Minnesota. The April 30 event featured teams from Academy of Holy Angels, Big Lake and Chisago Lakes as well as the Vikings.

The Vikings took first in four of the boys' and two of the girls' races. The Viking girls collected five seconds and the boys were runners-up twice.

Boys

Nick Ramberg took two firsts. The senior ran a 4:39 to take the 1600 meter run and won the 1000 in 2:41. Classmate Aaron Cedergren won the 400 in 55.2 and the 4x400 relay team (Cedergren, Ryan Norman, JJ Koerber and Zach Good) took first in 3:47.5.

Koerber was second in the 400 in 55.3, only one tenth behind Cedergren. The other second went to Brian Grand, who finished the 60m hurdles in 10.3.

Girls

Randi Zentner was first in the 60m hurdles in 10.5 and Kristen Robatcek took the high jump with a best of 4-10.

The 4x200 relay team (Alyssa Houle, Cori Fairbanks, Tess Prouty-Kunshier and Kacie Ramberg) were second with a time of 2:00.1. Eighth grader Sadie Kolke was runner-up in the 800m run (2:37.9), Ali Zimmerman was second in the 1000 (3:35.6) and Catie Bettendorf finished right behind Zentner in the hurdles with a time of 10.9. The girls' other second went to the 4x400 relay team (Amanda Johnson, Ramberg, Prouty Kunshier and Sara Swanson) in 4:34.5.

The next scheduled event for the viking runners, jumpers and throwers is Tuesday, April 10 at Irondale.

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