The Shaler Area Varsity Track and Field team has officially wrapped up another season for the spring. Many athletes are sad that it has come to an end, since it is the last running sport this school year, adding to the memories from the cross country and indoor season in the fall and winter. There were still dozens of achievements that were made by the athletes of the 2022 season, due to many hours of hard work and perseverance.

The team competed in regular meets as well as the Pine Richland Last Chance Meet, the Baldwin Invite, the Pine Richland Invite, the Mars Invite, the 9/10 Butler Invite, the Latrobe Invite, and a few more. WPIALs were held at Slippery Rock University this year and states will be taking place this Friday.

“This season was a year to look back on for many reasons,” head coach Shawn Ryan said.

“This senior class missed an important year of track and field during their sophomore season due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Another aspect about this season that was something to reflect on was that this was the largest senior class since I took over in 2018. Even though some athletes had higher expectations about the season, there were many successes during this season. A school record was broken for Girls Pole Vault by senior Madison Ballew, that was an 11-year-old record. All-time top 10’s were achieved—a total of 8 top 10 school history performances. Our seniors are a special group of athletes. The amount of leadership and respect from the seniors impacted the underclassman and will greatly impact the younger athletes as well.”

A lot of the athletes not only broke several school records this season, but almost all athletes marked a new personal record in their given events.

“As a team, the season went a little rough as our 4×1 team went down with injuries,” senior runner David Kondraciuk said. “Personally it went really well for me. I had PR’d in the 200 and I meddled twice at the Latrobe Invite.”

Even with injuries and some sicknesses due to COVID-19, when the athletes came back they gave it their all and many were able to get chances to compete at the Invitationals, which only allow 2-3 athletes per event with sometimes over 30 schools competing in one place.

“For the way my season went, I was most proud of placing 5th in the 100m at the Pine Richland Varsity Invitational,” sophomore runner Daniel Presto said.

This year, there was a large group of kids that got invited to the WPIALS at Slippery Rock as well.

“The WPIAL individual championships were a good experience for 7 seniors: Madison Ballew, Samantha Hennen, Tyler Paszkowski, Ryan Paris, Jack Keenan, Josh Maida, and David Kondraciuk as well as Harrison Repko and Mark Povich, who are two underclassmen,” Mr. Ryan said. “Having such a close group of teammates take on this opportunity was a wonderful way to wrap up their senior season.”