Samo beats Hawthorne by a landslide

Lillian KalishStaff WriterGirls' track and field dominated the field in the first League meet of the season on Thursday, March 25 against Hawthorne High School.Samo’s team is more than five times larger than Hawthorne’s team, which brought around 20 athletes to the meet. It wasn’t just the numerical value of athletes that made Thursday’s win possible; it was the sense of community that the Samo team has maintained throughout the years.Coach Tania Fischer explained that the community building emphasis comes out very subtly during practice. The efforts to keep the team together, Fischer suggests allows for a more harmonized and united team.“Sometimes I ask the sprinters to run with the relay racers and everyone cheers for everyone else. It’s more of an attitude thing. We just want to keep the community together. Track meets are like three-ring circuses,” Fischer said. “We have events going on at all corners of the track and my goal is to bring everyone together.”Besides being brought together by their coaches, many of the team members have known each other throughout most of their high school careers.“There are a lot of seniors who have been on track for so long and they are all friendly with each other," senior long jumper Yvonne Lu said. "We’re pretty much at the top of our game now and everyone is a lot more focused this year. There aren’t any dead weights. That really helps to create a sense of community."During the meet, sophomore sprinter Taylor DeYoung distinguished herself by coming in first for the 300m hurdles at a time of 56.9 seconds and freshman Caitlin Smith came in first for the 3200m run at 12 minutes 46 seconds.Besides being talented on the field, throwers coach Cerenity Young explains that these athletes often split their time with other sports.“Many of my students do other sports off the field. I have Zaire Overton who is also the goal keeper for the girls’ soccer team and Jessica Walker who won the state championship for wrestling," Young said. "It is also important that these girls excel both on the field and in the classroom. I want to make sure they keep up their grades because you can’t get anywhere without academics."Young wants to make sure her athletes keep their grades up because though they excel at sports, she wants her students to make academics a top priority as well.In the upcoming months, girls’ track will be training hard preparing to battle it out during the Ocean League Championships in May.lkalish@thesamohi.com