Meet 2: Centaurs prosper at Bethel Invitational
Woodstock Academy indoor track coach Josh Welch had the opportunity to go with his Eastern Connecticut Conference friends to a league developmental meet in Providence.
Or, he could elect to just take his indoor track teams to the Bethel Invitational across the state.
He chose the latter.
“It was a great meet to give the kids a chance to stack up events. We had some kids running three events and the experience and workout was great for them. Lots of kids had a chance to try things for a first time,” Welch said.
And the Centaurs experienced success as well as the girls brought home five 1st-place finishes, the boys finished best in four events and a host of athletes qualified for state championship competition.
Sophomore Christian Menounos had a pretty nice day.
“His overall performance was excellent,” Welch said. “His 1000m time shows he’s capable of doing some big things in the postseason.”
Menounos finished first in 2 minutes, 42.72 seconds in the 1000.
That was just about five seconds off the Woodstock Academy record.
A record, ironically, still held by Welch when he competed for the Academy.
It’s the last record that Welch’s name is next to on the track history board.
“My goal in coaching has always been to help kids break those records. The 800m fell to Ian (Hoffman) last spring. It will be exciting to see the 1K fall to Christian,” Welch said.
Menounos also finished first in the 3200m race later in the competition.
Senior Vincente Bastura also had a strong day as he finished with a decisive first in the 1600m and was also a member of two relay teams that had strong finishes.
He joined Charles Caggiano, Joel Koleszar and Colton Sallum for a 1st-place finish in the 4x800m in 9:18.
He was also a part of the sprint medley team alongside Rocco Corrado, Owen Tracy and Sallum which finished second.
The sprint medley team improved its time by 10 seconds with a 4:08 finish and is now just eight seconds away from qualifying for state championship competition.
The boys 4x200m relay team of Jeff Phongsa, Corrado, Carter Saracina and Braedon Emerson did qualify for the States with a second-place finish.
Liam Wilcox, a jack-of-all trades for the Centaurs, finished fifth in the pole vault as he cleared 9-feet.
