Titans track dominates league competition

“There’s a lot of untapped potential”

So far, so good for the Crested Butte Titans high school track team. After posting numerous solid results against bigger schools from the Western Slope a week ago, the Titans dominated their 2A peers at the Center Invitational on Friday, March 21.
Coach Dustin Simoens and his staff had a full squad for the Center meet with the addition of Forrest Smith and Aiden Truettner to their distance programs, adding additional firepower to the Titans arsenal.
“We are up to full strength now,” says Simoens.
Simoens admits confidence was high heading into the meet as the Titans saw massive success against the same programs at last year’s league championships. Still, he had no idea the Titans would finish as strong as they did in the end, with both the boys and girls teams winning the overall team competitions.
“We had pretty good confidence going into the meet but we exceeded our expectations,” says Simoens. “We were strong pretty much all around.”
Furthermore, while the coaches used the opportunity to try out athletes in a couple of new events, the Titans still ran away with the meet.
“We mixed things up in the sprint relays and they competed really well,” says Simoens. “It was good to see we could mix things up and still be competitive.”
The Titan boys finished the day with five trips to the top of the podium and a number of additional top-three finishes.
Kaleb Schultz is on pace to dominate the league in the sprints, opening the meet winning the 100-meter dash. Truettner and Smith came out firing in their first meet of the year as Smith won the 1,600 meters with Truettner in second, and then followed that placing second and third, respectively, in the two-mile run.
“They did really well considering, they just joined us this past week,” says Simoens.
Dakota Wiggins is gaining steam with each week, taking second in the 400-meter dash. The boys sprint relay teams crushed their events, winning three of four relays that day.
Kyle Boyle is the Titans mid-distance specialist, placing third in the 800 meters and Liam Mortell rounded out the Titans effort placing fourth in both the discus and shot put.
 The girls followed suit with success all across the board as well.
Suzanna Dumas and Sienna Brooks continue to generate key overall team points with strong showings in the hurdle events. Dumas and Brooks placed third and fourth in the 100-meter hurdles, with Dumas returning to the hurdles to place third in the 300-meter event.
Ali McGuire proved her prowess in a number of events, highlighted by her third-place finish in the 100-meter dash and second-place finishes in the long jump and the triple jump.
The Titans racked up a couple of podium finishes in the relay sprints and Shannon Costello was on fire in the middle distance events, as she won the 400 meters and then lined up for the 800-meter race to place second.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth Kilpatrick leads the charge in the distance events as she posted second-place finishes in the 1,600-meter and 3,200-meter runs.
But there’s more to the Titans then podium finishes, as proved by Jamey Spahn. Spahn put together two gutsy efforts in the day that earned her the weekly Golden Shoe Award from Simoens. After turning herself inside out in the 4×400-meter relay, she lined up to help the 800-sprint medley relay team place second.
“She had an anchor leg in the 400-meter relay that was just beastly,” says Simoens. “She just showed guts and toughness.”
Amidst all of their recent success, the Titans have yet to practice on a track. Simoens hopes to take his team to the track in Gunnison this week for workouts and start working on the next phase of development for the team.
“So far, so good but we still need to get our times down,” says Simoens. “There’s a lot of untapped potential.”
Simoens and the coaching staff hope to use the track workout and the upcoming meet in Cedaredge to set a baseline for their athletes and then start pushing them to bring speed to their workouts.
“There’s still a long way to go,” says Simoens. “We’re hoping to see them set some personal best times at Cedaredge. “