Roland-Story girls track continues to rise

The Roland-Story girls track and field team is preparing for the end of the season, but not before putting forth a few top performances first.

The Norsemen have been performing well as the regular season is starting to come to an end, and head coach Andy Herrick said the season has gone pretty well for them, with the Drake Relays also coming up.

Roland-Story is coming off a first-place finish at the Norsemen Relays on April 18, and Herrick said it has been able to do so well in part because of its ability to stay healthy and its depth.

“We can put [our jv girls] in some varsity events and they can hold their own, so it’s been nice to have that depth,” Herrick said. “And we’ve got a lot of sprinters and distance runners to kind of play around with.”

As the girls continue to improve as the season nears its end, a few will also be preparing for the Drake Relays as both the 4x100 relay team and sprint medley qualified.

Herrick said Roland-Story has a couple of meets where the team will get more practice in, while he plans to take the rest of the days this week lighter.

“I treat meets as like a practice and then practices dedicated to just honing in those specific skills and really pinpointing handoff work, block work, that kind of thing,” Herrick said.

He added that since the girls have been to Drake before, they know what to expect, and now that they have qualified, the nerves are out of the way, so now it’s about the fun part of being there.

Though only a select few will be preparing for the Drake Relays, once this week is over, the whole team will begin getting ready for the conference meet, which Herrick said is one of his favorites.

“Because it takes a team effort, every event, every placement goes to that conference win, so that’s kind of our next big goal,” Herrick said.

The Norsemen will also be hosting the state qualifiers this season, and Herrick said with the team running really well at home, and on a new track, he’s hoping it will be able to finish with a lot of state qualifiers.

Roland-Story will next compete at the South Hamilton meet at 4:30 p.m. April 23 at South Hamilton High School while the Drake Relays will take place April 25-27 at the Drake Stadium Track.

Boys golf falls short

The Roland-Story boys golf team had a tough week of play, dropping in both of its competitions this week.

The Norsemen opened the week against North Polk on April 15, where they fell 165-169.

Juniors Braylen Loots and Jack Birkland had strong days, leading Roland-Story tying for first and finishing third, respectively, with scores of 37 and 39. However, it wasn’t quite enough as the Comets just beat them out.

The Norsemen then looked to bounce back in the Bob Schmadeke Invitational on April 20, but finished eighth out of eight teams with a score of 378.

Loots once again led the way for Roland-Story, scoring a 90 to finish 18th overall at the meet.

Sophomore Hayden Janssen followed, placing just outside the top 25 at 26th with a score of 94 for the Norsemen.

Roland-Story will try to bounce back when it competes at the Saydel Invite at 4 p.m. April 23 at the Tournament Club of Iowa.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Roland-Story girls track continues to rise