More Records Set By Newtown High School Track Athletes

By Anna Hodge

Newtown High School’s girls’ and boys’ indoor track teams have had a busy and successful couple of weeks. The teams competed in South-West Conference developmental meets January 11 at the Newtown Youth Academy (NYA) and January 17 at Wesleyan University in Middletown. In addition, senior thrower John Wlasuk achieved success when he represented the team at the Lindy J. Remigino Indoor Track and Field Invitational on Saturday, January 8 at Wesleyan University, where he set two new school records.

Wlasuk placed first in both the weight throw event and the shot put competition at the invitational, where he broke his own school records. Wlasuk originally broke the record in 2010 in the weight throw with a throw of 50 feet, 7 inches, and his latest record-setting throw was 59-4. Also as the previous record holder in the shot put event with a throw of 49-11.5 inches, Wlasuk surpassed his previous school record with a throw of 55-5 inches. Wlasuk, the only competitor from NHS present, gave Newtown a tie for eighth place overall in the meet.

“I was happy with winning the shot put at 55-5, since it was my first meet of the year with competition from outside of the SWCs,” Wlasuk said. “As for the weight throw, the meet also doubles as the state championship because the weight throw is not contested at the state meets. It was an 8 foot personal record over my last meet of 2010, so I was pretty happy.” Wlasuk said he will be throwing at the Yale Classic, which he considers to be “the biggest meet of the year” so far, this Saturday and Sunday, January 21 and 22.

On January 11, the entire NHS track team competed at a combined junior varsity and varsity SWC developmental meet at the NYA. Standouts included seniors Ken Toal and Lauren Pettinelli.

Toal set a new school record in the boys’ 55-meter dash with a time of 6.6 seconds. The previous record was held by David Payne, with a time of 6.89 seconds, set in February of 1992.

Fellow senior Pettinelli set a new school record in the girls’ 55-meter hurdles, breaking her previous record of 8.93 set in February of 2010 at the SWC Championships.

Newtown Coach Doug Russell is pleased with the fact several team members have qualified for the SWC and State Class LL state championships even despite the fact the weather has resulted in the cancellation of one meet and important practices. Russell is appreciative of NYA officials for allowing the SWC teams to compete at the facility when a meet originally scheduled to be held at Wesleyan was postponed. The coach is proud of his athletes who are preparing for the postseason while juggling other responsibilities.

Newtown has one more developmental meet, on January 25, as the athletes try to qualify one last time for the postseason. The SWC Championships are slated for February 5.

“This is a critical time in our season because of the championship meet coming up and I want to commend each of our student athletes because they also have midterms going on and college planning as well. They truly are the best!” Russell said.