Track & Field: Newport Harbor’s Bender amazes in hurdles

NORWALK — Ever since the Mt. San Antonio College meet earlier this season, members of the Newport Harbor girls’ track 4x400-meter relay team have worn matching socks with the Superman logo.

The socks are fun but also serve to motivate Paige Fults, Emma Kratzberg, Lauren Loucks and Hope Bender.

“I love socks,” said Bender, the only senior on the relay, who originally wanted to get Superman socks with capes on them. “We couldn’t find those. I think that might have created a little bit more drag and slowed us down anyways.”

Nothing slowed down Bender on Saturday at the CIF Southern Section track and field divisional finals. She may not be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, but she did something else that was mighty impressive.

She set the Orange County record in the girls’ 300 hurdles in 42.51 seconds at Cerritos College, finishing second in the Division 2 girls’ race and punching her ticket to Friday’s CIF Southern Section Masters Meet.

Bender is one of three Newport-Mesa athletes to advance to Masters, and the other two are jumpers from Sage Hill. Lightning senior CJ McCord, who finished second last year at the CIF State Meet, defended his title in the Division 4 high jump by clearing 6-foot-9 on Saturday. The jump tied Division 2’s Elijah Hughes of J.W. North for top mark of the day.

Sage junior Chance Kuehnel also advanced to Masters tied for seventh in the high jump after clearing 6-5, which earned him fourth place in Division 4.

The top nine performances regardless of division in the sprints, hurdles and relays qualified for the Masters Meet, scheduled for Friday back at Cerritos College. The top 12 in the distance and field events also earned berths to Masters, which is a qualifier for the CIF State Championships.

The UC Santa Barbara-bound Bender did not race the 300 hurdles competitively until last month’s Orange County Championships. Her best time coming in was a 43.39, yet she bettered that by nearly a full second to set the Orange County record. She broke the record of Sharon Hatfield of Fountain Valley, which was a 42.55 set in 1982.

Bender’s private coach Eric Moreno told Bender after the race that she set the county record. Moreno would know, as he said Hatfield is a friend of his. But how did Bender do it?

“I’m still kind of trying to figure that out myself,” Bender said. “I never even considered [the 300 hurdles] until a month ago. I was just looking at where my niche was, like, ‘OK, where’s the field kind of the least deep?’ Looking ahead to Masters and State, the 400, 200 and 100 hurdles [have] really deep competition … the 300 just looked like, ‘OK, I can fit somewhere in that web of fast people.’ It just fit.”

Bender finished second in the Division 2 race to Juanita Webster of Redlands (42.45), nearly catching Webster at the end. She qualified fourth overall for Masters in the race. This, despite not really running a perfect race. She approached the second hurdle on the wrong lead leg, which resulted in an awkward clearance.

“Next week we can just fix those errors, make a couple more tweaks and I think I’ll be in a good position to take home a better time, another medal and hopefully on to state,” she said. “[Setting the Orange County record] is something I never even considered to do. In the history of Orange County we have had some really, really fast people, and so that’s really cool.”

McCord appears ready to challenge for a state title again, after a slow start to the season caused by an injured left knee from basketball.

“This year definitely I felt a lot more pressure, because of my injury and because I won [Division 4] last year,” said the Yale-bound McCord. “It was a lot harder to get focused [Friday] night and this morning. But, I don’t know, I just tuned everything out and ran on my own and stuff like that. That helped, I think.”

McCord cleared 6-9 on his first try before taking three failed attempts at 6-10 1/2, which would be a quarter-inch higher than his school-record mark from last year’s state finals. He said physically he feels about 85-90%.

“I think if I just come in with the same focus and mindset that I had today, I think I’ll do fine [next week at Masters],” McCord said. “My knee was bothering me a little bit on the 6-10 jumps, but I felt all right. I think I can do it in a couple of weeks.”

Newport Harbor sophomore Mike Jarboe had a personal-best 54-3 3/4 to finish third in the boys’ Division 2 shot put. He had the 13th best overall mark of the day, which leaves him as the first alternate for Masters.

“I did feel good,” said Jarboe, who hit his PR on his first throw. “I forgot my wrist wrap, actually, and [Division 2 champion] Malik [McMorris of Mater Dei] let me use his extra one. He let me keep it after that throw. He told me, ‘You know what, just keep it, you just PRed.’”

Several other locals also earned medals, awarded to the top six in each division. Bender was fourth in the girls’ Division 2 100 hurdles at 14.35, with Kratzberg in sixth in 14.83. Kratzberg also had a personal-best 44.24 to finish fourth in Division 2 in the 300 hurdles, though it wasn’t quite enough to advance to Masters. Bender is the first alternate for Masters in the 100 hurdles.

The Newport 4x400 relay team of Fults, Kratzberg, Loucks and Bender finished fifth in Division 2, lowering their own school record from last week’s preliminaries to 3:56.37.

“It’s a way for everyone else to see how hard we’ve worked,” Loucks said of the school record. “When you’re out there training and running at the end of the year and it’s just the four of us, it’s mental, but it’s still fun.”

Corona del Mar had nobody advance to Masters. Sophomore Raquel Powers finished fifth in the Division 3 girls’ 3,200 in 11:01.34, while senior Parker Nostrand finished sixth in the Division 3 boys’ 800 in 1:56.91.

Nostrand was seeded first in Division 3 and led for much of the race before fading down the stretch.

“He led it for 750 and you’re not supposed to do that, but he’s still learning the event,” said CdM Coach Bill Sumner, whose 4x400 relay of Omar Adel, Sutton Barbato, Austin Baxter and Nostrand was disqualified. “[Nostrand] is going to make a great college 1,500-meter runner.”

Costa Mesa senior Anuare Magana was fourth in the Division 3 boys’ 3,200 in 9:25.60. The Mustangs’ other competitor at finals, junior Paige LaBare, was ninth in the Division 3 girls’ 100 in 12.44.

McCord finished third in the Division 4 boys’ 400 in 50.37. Kuehnel was sixth in the Division 4 boys’ 110 high hurdles in 15.49.

Newport Harbor junior Rachelle A La Torre was fourth in the Division 2 girls’ discus with a best throw of 115-11, and seventh in the shot put (35-06.25). Newport sophomore Cole Smith was fifth in the Division 2 boys’ discus with a 156-00.

Though no Sailors throwers finished top 12 to advance to the Masters Meet, Coach Tony Ciarelli said the future appears bright. None of his three throwers competing at divisional finals were seniors.

“We have a lot more left,” Jarboe said. “With another year for [A La Torre] and another two years for [Smith and I], we’ll improve a lot more, for sure.”