by Chris Pfaff

Xavier Division 1 Event Videos

Xavier may have taken 9th at the Division 1 Championships on Thursday (5/2) and Saturday (5/4) at Red Mountain HS, but several significant individual performances provoked some joyful outbursts, especially on Day 2.

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The excitement began in the field events when SO Chloe Cundiff entered the triple jump competition ranked #21 among its participants, with a personal best of 33-11, and sitting outside of the Xavier All-Time Top Ten list for the triple jump.

On her very first attempt, Chloe cranked out a 34-6 1/2 ft jump. That one jump put her past the 34-ft barrier for the first time and into a new personal best, put her into the Xavier Top Ten list at #10, and allowed her to finish 11th (a far cry from her #21 ranking) in the State Division 1 competition.

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And then along came the Javelin throw featuring Xavier JR Alexa Zowine. Alexa began throwing the javelin just this year. On April 12th, she walloped the school record of 107-4 with a throw of 118 -1. On April 23rd, she broke the 120-ft barrier with a throw of 120-10.

On Saturday, she decided she liked the 120’s, so she bumped up her school record to 122-1 and finished in 3rd place.

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In Saturday’s first running event for girls, SR Kaira Burrage began what was to become one of the best — if not the best — hurdle doubles in Xavier history with a 100m Hurdles performance breakthrough.

After enduring weeks of frustration for not improving on her PR and #3 Xavier All-Time mark of 15.01 since March 7, Kaira smashed the 15-second barrier with a 14.72, placing 4th in Division 1, and moving her up #2 all-time for Xavier.

On March 2, Kaira ran 45.14 in the 300 hurdles, 4th all-time for Xavier and just 0.14 away from the breaking 45 seconds. Again, two months later, at the start of the 300 hurdles final on Saturday, she hadn’t improved.

With another breakthrough, Kaira obliterated the 45-second barrier, ending two months of frustration, with a time of 44.31, finishing in 5th place for the meet and moving up to #2 all-time for Xavier.

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In Saturday’s first running event for girls, it was Kaira Burrage. In Saturday’s final running event, it was Kaira again, along with three of her Gator teammates, who brought Xavier’s Division 1 Championships experience to a resounding crescendo.

At the beginning of the 2024 track season, the 4 x 400m Relay school record stood at 3:55.23, established in 2018. Finally, this year a Xavier 4×4 team wiped out that time with a 3:52.61. Our Division 1 Championships relay team of JR Marley Stoller (58.20), Kaira Burrage (59.12), JR Vivian Amoia (59.71), and JR Eleanor Borchard (54.68) brought it down even further: 3:51.71.

It was an outstanding effort by every single one of these girls, and that collective effort was brilliantly capped off by Eleanor’s spectacular anchor leg. You need to watch the video.

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The remaining scoring performances included:
— Eleanor Borchard: 3rd Place, 300 hurdles
— Marley Stoller: 5th Place, 400m
— Julia Russo: 4th Place, 3200m and 7th Place, 1600m
— Aymara Ubom: 7th Place, Discus
— The 4 x 800m Relay team of Jimena Guitierrez Moreno, Mia Stoller, Kaitlyn Markham, and Lily Beaver.

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Xavier Division 1 Event Videos

Complete Results on Athletic.net