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CALN TWP. — Looking back wasn’t going to help Chester Saturday afternoon in the 4 x 400.
Not figuratively, to the disappointment of their girls’ 4 x 100 relay, ranked fourth in Pennsylvania, finishing eighth at the District 1 Class 3A Championships and failing to make states.
Not literally, for 4 x 400 anchor Alasia Mosley, with Haverford’s Olivia Cieslak on her tail.
JaNasia Dearry knew that, and she delivered.
Dearry’s outstanding second leg gave the Clippers a huge lead, and Mosley held off Cieslak’s torrid anchor charge as Chester and Haverford capped the meet at Coatesville with a 1-2 finish.
Chester went 3:50.70, Damira Allen and Daleeah Alexander rounding out the quartet.
“We always just have to think, we have other races,” Dearry said of the figurative page-turn after the 4 x 100. “OK yes, you can feel mad, sad, but always know that you have other races that you can regroup for.”
Haverford (Riona O’Neill, Alyssa Bloxton and Ava Cavanaugh preceding Cielsak) went 3:51.11 in a pulsating race.
The Clippers were the last to hand off at the first exchange, but first at the halfway point, thanks to Dearry. She had been the runner-up in the 400 (55.75) and the 200 (24.56), which brought her a mixed bag of emotions to the finale.
Haverford was 5.2 seconds behind at 800 meters. Cavanaugh, who finished third in the 400, made up ground with the fastest third leg (56.05). (Dearry’s split isn’t recorded because of the three-turn stagger.)
Then Cieslak tore off after Mosley, who was among those disappointed on the day. She had been eighth in the 100 to make states. Allen medaled in both hurdles, third in the 100 and seventh in the 300.
Mosley summoned the third-fastest of the anchors in 56.63. Cieslak chewed up the deficit on the backstretch. Off the turn, she looked poised to overtake on the outside, the rare sensation of being the chaser fueling an outstanding 54.51 split. But Mosley managed to stave her off by four-tenths.
“I’m kind of just working with what the race is, what’s happening,” Cieslak said. “I tried to push, do the best I could for the team and for the time. They (Chester) were a great team, and their anchor leg is really great.”
Cieslak had finished her second straight mid-distance double by winning the 800 in 2:08.23. In drizzly conditions not conducive to improving her Delco record and states-best 2:04.77, she focused on negative-splitting and ran her usual composed, controlled race. Though she stuck within nine-tenths, runner-up Ella Woehlcke never looked a threat to surge past the long-and-strong Cieslak.
Cieslak nearly added a storybook coda in the relay. But Dearry, watching Mosley hang on, instead got to enjoy the final podium.
“Don’t get caught,” Dearry said. “Just … don’t get caught. That’s all.”
• • •
One can’t help but notice that Felicia Grimmelbein isn’t the tallest hurdler. Or that as she stood on the sixth step of the 300-meter podium, she still wasn’t taller than the eighth-place finisher, a step down on her right.
None of that matters on the track for the Garnet Valley junior, who has made tremendous strides this year that will culminate in states.
Grimmelbein went 45.55 to hit the states standard in the 300 hurdles. She qualified for districts in the 100 and the 200, but she’s taken a shine to the hurdles, after injuries limited her last season. Grimmelbein’s mentality scales up to the race before her.
“I think for me, it’s just the idea that I can’t stand seeing someone in front of me,” she said. “Of course I love the girls and it’s so amazing to be here performing. But I think 300 hurdles is mostly a mindset where, it’s basically a 400 and a 200 combined with obstacle courses.”
That applied in relays, too. Grimmelbein ran just one individual event to bolster the Jags’ chances of making states. She anchored a sixth-place finish in the 4 x 100 in 49.28, with Laura Wert, Avery McCrimon and Rebekah Burnshaw. It’s the first Garnet Valley relay, boys or girls, to reach states since 2019 and the first ever girls 4 x 100 to get there. The 4 x 400 – Ava Kanzinger, Grimmelbein, McCrimon and Kendall Cotrell – finished eighth to also make states.
The qualification is part of Grimmelbein’s inheritance in the program. She’s easy to pick out on track in her electric blue leg covers. They’re a gift from her mentor, Anna Saboja, that have become a lucky charm. She hopes the luck carries as far as Shippensburg.
“Just to get to states at all is great, because we haven’t had a team qualify in the relays for finals for districts,” she said. “So getting to states is a huge accomplishment.”
• • •
Katelyn Anderson followed her typical routine. She got her pre-race pump-up from Radnor senior Zoe Margolies. She stayed in a group with Margolies in the 3,200 as long as her legs allowed.
But then, when the 15th-seeded freshman saw an opportunity, she went off-script. The improvisation will take her to states.
Anderson finished sixth, a spot behind Margolies. Both made states, Margolies for the final run of her career before attending Tufts University, Anderson in a quantum leap.
Margolies went 10:59.54. Anderson was 11:05.63. Margolies was eighth in this race last year to reach states.
Anderson’s best time had been 11:17.18 at Delcos. She summarily destroyed that. She was ninth at 2,400 meters and steadily climbed in the final two laps.
“At first I wasn’t really sure because I was seeded 15th, so I didn’t think it would be possible to qualify for states,” Anderson said. “I saw everyone start to slow down and took the chance.”
• • •
NOTES >>. Penncrest’s Zoe Clark made states in the 200 by finishing seventh in 25.70. She’ll also run a relay, teaming with Olivia Clark, Regina Zizivily and Maddux Morgan to finish third in the 4 x 100 in 48.69. Josephine Ochwat medaled in the shot put with a PR of 34-6.5.
