Sometimes to break a drought, you need to schedule a track meet–at least that’s what it seems with the RustBuster! After a track season without a drop of rain, RustBuster Saturday dawned with rain clouds blowing over the Santa Cruz mountains…maybe California’s Central Valley farmers should fund a weekly RustBuster Invitational!
There are 700 athletes who would think that a weekly race at Monta Vista would seem like a good idea, because there were 700 athletes on the field ready to get their season started on Saturday morning, March 7. The RustBuster is Monta Vista’s own season opening competition, and twelve schools came to Monta Vista for a day of track and field.
The first race at 9am was the girls’ 100m hurdles, and getting the meet started right, Aneesha Nema from Lynbrook ran the fastest high hurdles race in all CCS so far this season. It’s nice for the RustBuster to be seen as a meet where people can put up nice early season times as well as shake off the rust at the beginning of a season! It didn’t take long for the home squad to make their own mark, as Monta Vista sophomore won the frosh-soph division 65m hurdles race with a 10.47 mark–MVTF’s first, but not last, gold medal for the day.
In the 1600m races, the strong Monta Vista distance team started to make a statement, as Johns Hopkins-bound senior Triya Roy pulled away for a season-opening win and a fine 5:20 clocking–the fifth fastest 1600 in CCS so far this young season, with Nikhita Saldi gave Monta Vista a sweep on the podium with a win in the F-S girls’ 1600m race. The girls’ 100m race featured several athletes that could be in the CCS championship finals two months from now, and twins Brooke and Bianca Young went 2-4 into a cold breeze to make a statement about their intentions this season–compete hard all year long.
The distance runners got on a bit of a roll that started to rack up medals, as Rohun Agrawal (varsity boys’ 3200), Matthew Sun (F-S boys’ 3200), Sylvana Northrop (varsity girls’ 3200) and Avani Kalari (F-S girls’ 3200) put together a sweep of the longest race of the day by the host squad! Sydney Stevens added a silver in the F-S girls’ 800, and Andrew Cole also medaled in the frosh-soph 3200m race.
Over in the field events, the early season promise of the throwing group was being tested. Monta Vista has more throwers on the team than any team in the last decade, and everyone was ready to test the group competitive action. The boys grabbed five medals in two events, with Martin Xiao, Henry Hodgkins, and Eric Zheng going 2-3-4 in the varsity boys’ shot put, then coming back in the afternoon to see Eric and Martin take 1st and 3rd in the discus! The girls chipped in three medals too, as newcomer Olivia Tsui earned a third place in the frosh-soph girls’ shot put and a fifth place medal in the discus, and Anoushka Lakshmi added a 6th place medal in the shot. In the varsity girls’ high jump, captain Sammi Dunn took second and senior Catherine Cole grabbed 5th as they both matched personal bests in their first meet of the season and looked strong in the process. Freshman Greyson Mobley earned a high jump medal in his first high school meet ever, while Cheryl Bai and newcomer Mary Choy both earned triple jump medals. Nice job, field squad!
Back on the track, the relay teams finished the meet with excitement that brought a cheering throng onto the field! Monta Vista teams contributed to the excitement, with third place finishes in both boys’ and girls’ varsity sprint medley relays, and almost adding another podium finish when Nerea Northrop’s dramatic effort to catch the third place St Ignatius team came up an agonizing 0.5 seconds short. In the 4x400m relay, an event that has earned a special place in MVTF’s heart, the varsity squads took second place in both events–and both teams are also now ranked in the Central Coast Section top-10 for this early season. The 4×4 is another event where the RustBuster could foreshadow a confrontation on the Gilroy track in May as the same teams could face off in the CCS Finals. And in the frosh-soph girls’ 4×400, the Monta Vista squad scored a final gold medal for the day, holding off a game Fremont team for the victory!
Medals are nice, but we can’t always control where we place. We can control our effort level, including our preparation over the winter–and this can be reflected in personal records we set over the course of a season. It can be hard to set a new PR in the first meet of the year, as athletes are comparing their marks to achievements made last year at the end of a full season of competition and work, but Monta Vista athletes still put up quite a few PRs. Setting a PR at RustBuster says something about how hard these athletes are working already. PRs set by Monta Vista athletes include: Parky Sood (400m), Jason Yip (800), Tyler Liu (800 and 1600), Rohun Agrawal, Justin Yu, Matthew Sun, Andrew Cole (all 3200), Upasana Dilip (1600–first time under 6!), Jannah Sheriff and Ellie Hsu (3200), Tabitha Mendez (shot and discus), Nicole Raphael (discus), and Cheryl Bai (long and triple jump). Freshmen and first time MVTF athletes are not included in this list, and I apologize if I missed anyone. Congratulations on your PRs, everyone–you earned these marks and we hope you are proud of your accomplishments!
Complete results are posted Hank Lawson’s CCS site. CCS top 10 rankings, featuring quite a few marks from Rustbuster and from Monta Vista athletes, can be found on athletic.net. Mr Ma was kindly at the meet taking photographs, and has uploaded quite a few MV athlete photos and also a folder of general RustBuster photos.
Great job, Monta Vista…not only for the way you competed on the track, but for the way you hosted our meet. You were happy and gracious and positive and very, very helpful. Even during the rain, you helped keep a positive attitude. I’m proud of you!
Parents volunteers and fans, Octagon volunteers, all the coaches–I can’t thank you enough (and I’m not going to list individually because I know I will miss some people and then I feel worse). A specific thank you though to Hank Lawson, our timer, and Jim Manha and JR Heberle, our USATF certified starters, who came and gave such great support (we are already on their calendars for Rustbuster 2021!).
A couple last reminders while you are here:
- Photo day on Tuesday, wear shorts-singlet-jacket, uniform pants are optional.
- Parents, please join MVAB! We are 2/3 of the way to 100% membership. We can’t do this without your support!
- Next meet is Thursday, March 12, hosting Mountain View in our first dual meet of the year. Parents, please come and watch and cheer (and parents, we could always use a few volunteers to help
