With a select group of standouts at an out-of-state meet, Platte County pieced together some strong results in Thursday’s Falcon Relays held at North Kansas City District Activities Complex in Kansas City. The Pirates were fourth out of 12 teams in the final standings with event victories for the 4×800-meter relay, junior Zaden Batey in the 110-meter hurdles and senior Drew Tyson in the high jump.
Platte County totaled a fraction under 70 points due to ties and were just 10 out of second place.
With the top sprinters at the Texas Relays, Platte County’s team of senior Blake Herron, junior Nick Flowers and sophomore Josiah O’Rourke and Landon McKinzie stood out for the relays, running a season-best of 8 minutes, 35.85 seconds. Herron, Flowers, O’Rourke and junior Jordan Moore also combined to finish third in the distance medley relay with legs of 1,200, 400, 800 and 1,600 meters. The Pirates finished in 11:20.03.
With the extra relays, long-distance individual events were limited.
However, Batey ran a PR in the 100 hurdles at 15.73 in his second race of the season and fourth in two years to lead a 1-2 finish for Platte County. Jaden Mathurin, another junior, came in second at 15.85, just off his career-best of 15.68 from the season-opening Liberty North Time Trials.
Platte County junior Maverick Troncin also turned in the program’s season-best 300 hurdles time of 42.88 to finish third.
In the field events, Tyson notched a breakout performance and set a career-best of 1.87 meters in the high jump. He previously went 1.78 in the previous weekend’s Ron Ives Invitational, and all three recorded heights this season have been better than the 1.73 PR he set as a sophomore.
Kyler Parker, a junior and Class 5 Sectional 4 qualifier last season, added a third-place finish in shot put at 14.09 meters with freshman Jayden Horn right behind him in fourth at 13.84 meters. Parker also came in fourth in the discus (39.42 meters) after setting a career-best a week earlier, and senior Dany Biganiro adde a fifth n the triple jump at 12.10 meters.
