Chris Burley, a senior pole vaulter for Great Bend High School, shattered his own school record on Tuesday to highlight the Great Bend Invitational at Memorial Stadium.
Burley rocketed over the bar at 15 feet, a personal best, in three attempts after reaching a school record 14-7 earlier.
“I wanted to get back to where I was last year, and I thought one inch isn’t going to matter, so I went for 14-7 and got it,” Burley said. “I was pretty happy with that, and thought I might as well go for 15. Coming into this meet, that’s what I wanted.
“What’s next is 15-6, which is the (Western Athletic Conference) record I think, so I want to jump 15-7 by the end of the year.”
He set the previous school record of 14-6 at the WAC meet last season.
“We didn’t get to do varsity last week,” Great Bend head coach Bo Black said. “We had a lot of kids in there that just needed some work and to get some practice, so for him to go 15 feet on a night like tonight was really awesome.
“To have the highest jump ever in school history right here at home was pretty special for him.”
The invitational was a combined varsity and junior varsity meet after the varsity competition was postponed due to inclement weather on April 9. No team scores were kept.
“We had a lot of kids here from a lot of schools,” Black said. “I think this was what everybody needed to just get some times for some kids.
“It was a JV invitational, but we opened up to all the schools that missed last week. We probably ran everybody with exception to about 20 kids.”
Anthony Valenzuela reached a distance of 19-5 to win the long jump for Great Bend.
Antonio Carrasco of the Panthers won the 400-meter dash (53.94 seconds), and Quinton Elliott finished first in the 1,600 run (5:07.29).
Makayla Johnson led a trio of first-place finishers for the Lady Panthers.
Johnson won the 100 dash (13.77).
Sarah Niederee claimed the gold medal in the 100 hurdles (20.13).
“Two young girls who are starting to get in better shape,” Black said of Johnson and Niederee. “I thought all of our girls all-in-all had a good day.
“Makayla is someone that we’ve been hoping would come around, and she’s finally starting to get her legs underneath her.”
Hannah Middleton took first place in the pole vault at 10-0.
Great Bend travels to Buhler on Friday for a meet starting at 4 p.m.
From: http://www.gbtribune.com/section/43/article/51568/
