No Break after Drake

Qualifying Comet 4-by-100 relay team due for a busy weekend

By John Burbridge sports@charlescitypress.com

CHARLES CITY — He had to be joking … right?

At least that’s what Brianna Carey thought with an incredulous “Are you kidding me?” look on her face.

Charles City girls track coach Darren Bohlen had indicated that after the Comets 4-by-100 relay team of Carey, Sadie Ruzicka, Sami Heyer and Alex Litterer competes in the preliminary rounds Friday at the prestigious Drake Relays, that they’re going to hustle back to join the rest of their teammates for a coed meet at Hampton-Dumont that same night.

“But there are rules that you can’t run the same event the same day at two different meets,” Bohlen said.

Nonetheless, he could still find use for the foursome in others events, especially those involving the hurdles for Carey and Ruzicka.

Carey, a senior, and Ruzicka, a junior, are not green when it comes to running and jumping along the blue track at Drake Stadium. Two years ago, they helped set a school record in the 4-by-100 shuttle hurdle relay at the State Track and Field Championships.

Carey has been a state-qualifier in all of her previous three years as a track athlete for Charles City.

“But this is my first time as a Drake Relays qualifier,” Carey said. “It’s exciting to make it to state, but this (qualifying for DR) is something I’ve always dreamed of doing. It’s hard for me to describe the feeling of finally making it.”

Ruzicka said that he experience of competing at state and within Drake Stadium may help ease the nervous excitement, but she knows this is a much different stage.

“There are going to be some of the best college athletes in the country down there,” Ruzicka said. “It’s just going to be more intense.”

For sophomore Heyer, becoming a Drake Relays-qualified athlete is a testament to her resiliency. One of the best all-around underclass Comet athletes, Heyer is coming off a major knee injury sustained as a freshman varsity basketball player.

“I’m not nervous,” Heyer said, “just excited.”

Litterer, who was a varsity athlete even before she was a freshman as she played sparingly for the Comets softball team last summer, said that she “never imagined making to the Drake Relays” in her first year of high school track.

Unfortunately, the Comets’ top sprinter, Katie Foster, will not make the trip to Des Moines with her teammates. A Drake Relays qualifier as a freshman and state runner-up in the 200 as a sophomore, Foster made the cut to run in the 100 and helped the 4-by-100 make its cut during a meet in New Hampton less than a week before the deadline.

Illness has prevented Foster from competing in the event’s 108th running.

If things go really well for the Comet foursome, they will return for the finals on Saturday.

“But the thing is when you go into a meet like this, you should try to improve from your seeding,” Bohlen said. “We’re coming in ranked at 67th. Hopefully, we can get better than that.