This past week the Fountain Hills High School track and field team competed in its first meet and invitational of the 2020 season.

On March 4 the Falcons traveled to Saguaro High School where they competed against Saguaro, Combs and St. Mary’s.

Then, three days later on March 7, the Falcons competed in the Fifth annual Small Schools Invitational with nearly 50 other schools competing.

The track team is off this week for spring break but will return for more stadium events on March 21 and 20 at the 80th Nike Chandler Rotary.

Saguaro

In their first meet of the season more than five Falcons placed in the top five for their event.

On the boys team in the 300m race Tim Lamar placed third with a time of 39.4, followed by his teammate, Gavin Furi, in fourth with a time of 40.5.

In the 600m race Jaden Gibson secured second place with a fast time of 1:37.4. Then, in the mile, Tyler Irvin-Violetie came in fifth with an impressive time of 5:34.4.

In the field events Calvin Lupien placed first in the high jump clearing a height of 5’2”. Lupien’s teammate, Joseph Cahill, finished in third jumping a height of 4’6” and Connor Smout came in fifth with a leap of 4’4”.

On the girls team Stephanie Lies dominated both the shot put and discus events, coming in first in both. Lies threw the shot put a distance of 27’3.5” and the discuses a distance of 80’5”.

Holly Garrett placed first in the pole vault event clearing a height of 8’6” and, in the high jump event, Rachel Walter came in first jumping a height of 3’10”.

Invitational

Head coach Nick Goodman said he was proud of how his extremely young team handled the Small Schools Invitational.

“For many on the team this was their very first meet with almost 50 schools participating. Overall, the team did well for their first major invitational,” Goodman said.

Three Falcon performances in particular stood out to him.

“Porter Sweet took home a first place medal in the javelin throw with a distance of 167’06” to set a new Fountain Hills school record,” Goodman said. “Stephanie Lies placed second in the javelin throw with a distance of 110’03”. She also placed fifth in the discus throw with a distance of 90’05”. Holly Garrett placed sixth in the pole vault with a height of 7’06”.