Hendrickson and Jensen sweep pole vault, Myles and Filipiak finish 1-2 in high jump
Four International Falls Broncos qualified for state Friday by finishing first or second in their respective events in the Section 7A championships at the University of Minnesota Duluth.
Tim Myles and Shawn Filipiak finished 1-2 in the high jump, while Jake Jensen and Alicia Hendrickson swept the pole vault. For Hendrickson, it’s her second straight section title in the event.
“Jake was hoping for those two to go (to state), so he could have some fun,” said Hendrickson, who cleared 9 feet and defeated the field by a foot.
“I had to make sure I had good speed all the way down, a high plant and then swing my feet up good,” she said.
Hendrickson was tied with four competitors heading into last year’s section championships, but this season was a different story as the sophomore continues to improve.
“This year I was ahead of everyone by a foot, so it wasn’t as nerve-racking,” Hendrickson said.
For Jensen, it’s just another notch on his belt this season. The sophomore is undefeated in the outdoor season in the event and cleared 12-4 on Friday.
“It feels pretty good to come out and do that,” Jensen said. “It’s a lot of hard work. I wasn’t born with it.”
Jensen’s personal-best is 13 feet, and he’ll look to reach as high as 13-6 at this week’s state competition.
“That’s what I’m looking for is a state title this year,” he said.
The Class A State championships run June 5-6 at Hamline University in St. Paul. The Class A sessions begins at 3 p.m. each day.
As for Myles and Filipiak, one state berth turned into two when Filipiak won a tiebreaker with numerous other jumpers. The second-place finish was news to the sophomore.
“I walked up and they showed me the second and I was like ‘Oh,’” said Filipiak, who thought he finished fourth. Myles won the meet at 5-10 and Filipiak cleared 5-7. A handful of other competitors failed to clear 5-10, so the tiebreaker came back to 5-7. Filipiak cleared the height on his first attempt and didn’t scratch, giving him the runner-up finish.
“It’s nice. We wanted to do it since the beginning of the year,” Filipiak said. “ ... And it ended up happening.”
Myles missed a large amount of time this season due to an academic violation, but he returned a couple weeks ago and hadn’t lost his hops. He admitted he’ll never win any meets with his form, but he’s excited to extend his season into the state competition.
“Going into each meet I want me and Shawn to get first and second,” Myles said. “Doesn’t matter who gets first, as long as we get first and second.”
Each individual event had a preliminary heat followed by a finals heat.
For the boys, Brandon Richards finished sixth in the 200-meter dash in 24.72 seconds and seventh in the shot put at 42.05, Thomas Briggs was seventh in the 400 in 55.12 and Aaron Skoglund was seventh in the 110 hurdles in 17.18.
The 4x100 relay was fifth in 47.03, the 4x200 was sixth in 1:38.18, the 4x400 finished fourth in 3:44.55 and 4x800 finished third in 8:46.72.
On the girl’s side, Stephanie Christianson finished fifth in the 3,200 in 12:55.27 and Katie Solo was sixth in the discus at 93-11. In relays, the 4x100 finished sixth in 1:54.69 and the 4x400 finished seventh in 11:02.87.
As a team, the Bronco boys finished fourth with 56 points — behind Proctor (77.5), Esko (72) and Eveleth-Gilbert (67), and the girls finished 13th with 23 points. Esko won the girls meet with 131.5.
No preliminary results for competitors finishing outside of the finals heat were available.
