By AARON CALHOUN

For The Beachcomber

The Vashon Pirate track and field team traveled south for a four-way meet with Steilacoom, Orting, and Seattle Christian on April 30.

On the track, Savannah Krug and Grace Dzyacki kicked things off on a positive note by finishing first and second in the 3200-meter run.

Tyler Stoffer took more than half a second off his personal best in the 110-meter hurdles by stopping the clock at 17.30 seconds.

All five boys who ran the 1600 meter set new season bests, while Krug ran the race in under six minutes for the first time all season, finishing second.

The 100-meter relay team of Nathan Betz, James Spencer, Nick Fox-Edele and Stoffer took advantage of some improved handoff work and dropped their time to 47.07 seconds.

Spencer then raced up to fourth in the district in the 400 meter by gliding to a time of 53.35 seconds; Alia Payne followed up with a victory in the girls 400 meter.

Taylor Hernandez and Lyndsey Straube both scaled the 300-meter hurdles in personal bests, with Hernandez doing so by four seconds.

Spencer and Fox-Edele blazed through the 200 meter almost a second faster than either ever had before rejoining Betz and Stoffer to finish second in the mile relay in a time of 3:42.85.

In the field, Tim Hill threw an all-time best of 130 feet, 9 inches, in the javelin, while Bryce Pardee finally broke 30 feet in the shot put.

Kirstie Edwards threw the discus 46 feet, 5 inches, bettering her best by more than five and a half feet.

Finally, the power of the Jovanovich brothers was on display as Timmy threw for personal records in both the shot put (31 feet, 2.5 inches) and the discus (90 feet); Vince did one better by throwing for all-time bests in all three throwing events, the highlight being a near 20-foot improvement in the discus.

The Pirates competed at the BCS Invitational at Bellevue High School on May 2 and finish their regular season at Charles Wright Academy tomorrow, May 7.

— Aaron Calhoun is the Pirate track and field team’s distance coach.