Page 16/The Sun and News, Saturday, April 17, 2021Trojan senior wins his first varsity 200
Brett Bremer
Sports Editor
Thornapple Kellogg senior
Wyatt Helzer was finally in a
position to make a choice to
make himself happy. It
helped his team too.
Helzer won the 200-meter
dash at the Thornapple
Kellogg varsity track and
field team’s season opening
meet with Cedar Springs in
Middleville Tuesday. He hit
the finish line in new person-
al record time of 23.64 sec-
onds.
Helzer last won a compet-
itive 200-meter dash at the
OK Gold Conference Middle
School Championship in
2017, winning a conference
championship in 25.90 sec-
onds, a little less than half a
second slower than his PR at
the time. He ran an exhibi-
tion heat of the 200 during
his freshman season in 2018,
and also ran the race at the
OK Gold Conference JV
meet. He mostly competed in
the three sprint relays and the
long jump for TK as a soph-
omore in 2019.
“I wanted to do the 200 so
bad [this season], because I
wanted to relive those mid-
dle school memories, so I
just asked him if he could
switch me from the
[4x400-meter relay] to the
- No argument, no debate,
he just said sure, I will 100
percent do that.”
Helzer was a part of three
wins Tuesday, taking the
long jump with a personal
record mark of 19 feet and he
teamed with Logan Caruos,
Jonah Schilthroat andGilberto Tejada III to win the
400-meter relay in 47.32 sec-
onds. He was also a part of
the Trojan 800-meter relay
that that was DQ’d at the
meet.
“You’ve got an athlete like
that that you’re thinking how
am I going to use him and
you start strategizing as a
coach. I told him, look we
are going to tell you want we
want you to do, but we also
want to listen to you as ath-
letes,” Ruger said of his
Monday conversation with
Helzer. “So, he politely came
up like you hope a leader
would, and said I think I’d do
better in the 200 than I would
in the 400.
“And he did. He was right,
so sometimes they help us
out. It is not always that way
in other sports, but in track I
think it’s really neat to be
able to listen to you athletes
and let them be able to tell
you what they’re going to be
good at. He was right today.”
Those sprints weren’t
quite enough for the TK boys
as they were downed by their
new OK Gold Conference
foes from Cedar Springs
73-59. The TK ladies were
also bested by the Red
Hawks Tuesday, 75-62.
“It is so good to get back
at it immediately, after not
having a season junior year.
Track is my favorite sport of
all time. I love running. The
200, that is my heart and soul
of sport,” Helzer said.
“The end of the corner,that is when you really start
to book it,” he said of his- “The first turn here, it is
really kind of just making
sure you’re jerking that right
arm to get that momentum
going around the curve. As
soon as you hit that line
there, the 100-meter start,
you just try and go all out
and try and keep perfect
form.”
He could hear Cedar
Springs sophomore Antwuan
Nicholls breathing behind
his shoulder as they came
around the turn, but powered
through the final 100 meters
to get the win. Nicholls fin-
ished in 24.14. His TK team-
mate freshman Jaxon Sias
was third in 24.76. Nicholls
had already won the 100-
meter dash, in 11.55 seconds,
leading a sweep of the top
three scoring spots in the
race for the Red Hawks.
Cedar Springs also swept
the three scoring places in
the boys’ 1600-meter run, led
by Corey Bowers a senior
who finished in 5 minutes
8.99 seconds. Bowers won
the 800-meter run in 1:57.58,
finishing more than 20 sec-
onds ahead of his teammate
Clayton Akerman who was
the runner-up. Akerman was
also second in the 1600 and
won the 3200-meter run.
Coach Ruger is happy to
have some good leaders on
his team, Helzer and junior
Cam Reynolds among them.
He noticed Reynolds, a dis-
tance runner, greeting sopho-
more middle distance runner
Gabe Lajoye at the end of the
meet. Bowers chased down
Lajoye with a blistering
anchor leg in the 1600-meter
relay to give his Red Hawks
a win in that race.
“[Lajoye] gave it all he
could and he was feeling bad
because he thought he let the
team down. Cam goes over
and says, ‘look, you did a
great job. You did nothing
wrong. Keep it up. You’re
going to be fine.’ That is the
kind of kids we have, and I
am super proud of them.”
Lajoye was the runner-up
in the 400-meter dash with a
time of 58.58, behind Cedar
Springs senior Logan
Douglas who hit the finish
line in 53.94.
TK’s boys had some of
their best moments in the
field. TK swept the high
jump with senior Austin
VanElst first at 5-10, Sias
second at 5-8 and Alex
Harrington third at 5-4. TK
senior Blake Monroe won
the discus with a mark of
96-6 and the shot put at 36-0.
Quintin Carr, a junior, also
scored in both throws for TK
with a runner-up mark of
85-5 and was third int eh
shot put at 29-4.
Trojan senior Cameron
Gavette won the 300-meter
intermediate hurdles in 43.
and was the runner-up in the
110-meter high hurdles in
17.18. Cedar Springs senior
Alex Nylaan won the high
hurdles and was second to
Gavette in the 300’s.
It was a good day for the
TK girls in the hurdles too.
They swept the 100-meter
hurdles with freshman
Kristen Offringa winning in
17.65. Trysta Hilton was sec-
ond in 17.66 and Addison
Satterfield third in 19.47.
Senior Kylie Smith took the
300-meter low hurdles for
TK in 55.70.
The only other individual
wins on the track for the TK
girls came from sophomore
Lindsey Velting who took
the 100-meter dash in 14.
and the 400-meter dash in
1:09.67.
The TK ladies did win the
three sprint relays too.
Offringa, Anna Benedict,
Satterfield and Smith teamed
up to win the 400-meter relay
in 55.31; Hilton, Smith,
Benedict and Velting won
the 800-meter relay in
1:56.98; and the team of
Hilton, Offringa, Velting and
Lucy VanDemark won the
1600-meter relay in 4:35.50.
“My sprinters surprised
me,” TK girls’ coach Maggie
Wilkinson said. “That was
good.”
She said she took the ini-
tiative to put her girls in
some different events than
maybe what they were
expecting, and she though
overall they surprised them-
selves with their success too.
She said Velting’s 400 was
one of the events where she
pushed one of her runners
with the choice of events and
she really excelled according
to her coach.
Trojan girls were second
and third in both throws.
Dalace Jousma took the run-
ner-up spot in each with a
mark of 28-11 in the shot put
and 78-5 in the discus.
Preslee Hall was third in thediscus at 74-0 and Cassidy
Dole third in the shot put at
26-4.
Cedar Springs senior
Ariana Myers won both
throws with a mark of 79-
in the discus and 31-3 in the
shot put.
TK went 1-2 in the girls’
long jump with Benedict
winning at 14-8.5 and Smith
second at 14-5.
Cedar Springs freshman
Annalise Elliott won the
800-meter run in 2:45.99, the
1600 in 5:58.45 and the
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Thornapple Kellogg senior Kylie Smith flies over a
hurdle at the end of the curve in 300-meter low hurdles
Tuesday during the Trojans’ OK Gold Conference dual
with Cedar Springs in Middleville. (Photo by Brett
Bremer)Thornapple Kellogg
senior Wyatt Helzer gets
moving at the start of the
200-meter dash during
Tuesday afternoon’s
season opening meet
against Cedar Springs in
Middleville. (Photo by Brett
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continued from page 1