The Dripping Springs track team competed in a district wide competition on April 11 and 12. Varsity boys placed 6th, JV boys placed 6th, varsity girls placed 3rd, and JV girls placed 2nd overall. A total of 17 participants moved on to the Area meet.

Junior hurdler Hannah Biggs said she was very proud of the team as a whole.

“We started off prelims with a rain delay, and the meet ended up being postponed to Wednesday,” Biggs said. “However, the team pushed through and did very well going into Wednesday.”

Biggs came in first overall for the district.

“I ran the 100m hurdles twice on Wednesday because of rain delay –  once to qualify for finals and once to qualify for area,” Biggs said. “I was very happy to see how the hurdlers performed overall. Lightsey Puryear qualified for finals in the 100m which was amazing to see her do, as well as advancing into area in 300m hurdles. Justin Wright also made it to area for both races as well.”

Junior Justin Wright ran the varsity 110m and the 300m hurdles and placed 2nd in both.

“Every event has three people in the varsity division  and four in the junior varsity division, so almost all people make it to district,” Wright said. “The top four runners of each race and field event get to move on to area and then the top four from there move on to regionals.”

Sophomore Thomas Babiak said the district meet is a great experience.

“As a team, we had some athletes that were able to beat their best personal times which is always a good note to end the season on,” Babiak said. “There are some individuals among the team that are advancing to area, so if they do well at the area meet, they’ll progress to regionals then state.”

Wright says a lot of practice and dedication went into preparing for districts.

“In order to be a good runner you need to be dedicated to spending a lot of time doing all sorts of training,” Wright said. “For hurdles, we would do 1 hour of practice in the Morning, some of us would then lift weights in the track class, and then after school we did an hour of drills to make our form better and more efficient.”

The next meet of the season is area, which will hopefully help Dripping qualify for regionals.

“Dripping is doing very well and I believe that we will have a lot of fun running as a team in regionals when we get there,” Biggs said.

Wright says he is very excited about his improvement this year.

“Last year I advanced to area in only the 110s, but this year I’m moving on in both events I do and it is really fun to continually race against faster people,” Wright said. “Track is a great way to compete against others and to continually make yourself better.”

Nate Blevins – 4x400m relay (2nd)