State track and field day 1: Pueblo West's Pruce second in 4A boys discus, Aspen Fulbright places

Jun. 25—LAKEWOOD — The confidence gained from a school-record throw was the impetus behind Wyatt Pruce's second-place finish in the discus on Thursday.

Pruce's first throw of 166 feet was good enough for the Pueblo West senior to claim silver at the Class 4A state high school boys and girls track and field meet at Jefferson County Stadium in Lakewood.

Pruce had set a personal and school record of 171-9 during the South-Central League meet in the regular season and that mark qualified him for the state meet. It was that throw that gave him the confidence to do well at state.

"Last week at S-CL's, I threw 171-9 and the week before that I threw 140, so having that jump was really incredible," Pruce said. "Coming here I was super excited and I had a lot of confidence.

"It was all about the mental game. That's what was holding me back. My personal best happened at Dutch and I love throwing at Dutch."

Avery Shunneson of Thomas Jefferson won the discus with a throw of 192-6, a state meet record, breaking the record previously set by Pueblo East grad Kain Medrano in 2019 of 188-6.

Pruce wasted little time in getting off his best toss.

"I was super happy to get that throw out of the way," Pruce said. "I knew Avery was going to be a tough competitor. But coming out here anybody can have a bad day, he could have thrown three in the parking lot.

"I have to always come out with the mentality that I could possibly win. He threw his first throw and I threw my first so I knew where I stood. I thought now I can focus on breaking the school record, my record. We didn't do that but I'm super happy with second. I'll take that any day."

Already signed at the University of South Dakota to compete in track and field, Pruce still has the shot put ahead on Friday. He is ranked fourth in that event, giving the senior another great chance to place.

Three other Pueblo throwers competed on Thursday.

East's Xavier Freeman qualified for the discus finals and finished fourth with a toss of 151-4. It came on his first throw of the day.

Centennial's Ethan Gallegos and Kyle Bigley competed but didn't make the finals.

Despite not making the event finals, Gallegos achieved what few have. The senior practiced only three times all season in the event and qualified for state in his only meet of the season with a throw of 134-8.

Aspen Fulbright of Pueblo West finished sixth in the 4A girls 3200 meter run, running an 11:01.19.

Fulbright had qualified with a time of 11:06.24. She will also run the 1,600 meters at 4:05 p.m. Saturday.

Centennial's Troy Silver set himself up for a fantastic finish after winning his heat on Thursday and posting the fastest prelim time of the group to garner an automatic qualifying time for the finals. He won his heat in a time of 15.09, his fastest time of the year.

Silver also will try and qualify in the 300 hurdles at 11:30 a.m. on Friday.

The finals for the 100 hurdles are at 10:04 a.m. Saturday and for the 300 hurdles at 2:34 p.m. Saturday.

Leyah Martinez did what she needed to do in the preliminaries of the 4A girls 100 hurdles. The Pueblo East junior finished third in her heat to gain an automatic qualifier into the finals. She ran at 15.52, just above her personal best of 15.34.

"I just wanted to hit top three and qualify," Martinez said. "I want to see where I'm sitting at for the finals and see what kind of strategy I need to come up with."

Martinez, who is competing in four events at the state meet, also has the 300 meter hurdles ahead at 11:05 a.m. on Friday.

"I was a little blind-sided that I (qualified for state) in the 100 (dash)," Martinez said. "I just wanted to make sure I didn't waste all my energy going into the 100 hurdles.

"I want to do well in both hurdles. It all depends on my start and making sure I hit the steps I need to in both races. It just comes down to the race and my warmup beforehand."

South's Brooke Huth squeezed into the 100 finals with a time of 12.68. She was the ninth and final competitor to qualify for the finals, which will be run on Saturday.

4A boys pole vault

Luke Fowler of Pueblo West finished 11th in the field with a leap of 11-9.

4A boys 4x200 relay

The Pueblo West team of Malik Burnes, Collin Sheehan, Adam Armstrong and Ryan King finished 13th in the event with a time of 1:33.43 and failed to qualify for the finals.

Girls 100 meter

East's Martinez failed to qualify for the finals in Class 4A, finishing with a time of 13.14.

Swallows Charter Academy's Kaitlyn Pearson posted a time of 13.36 in 2A, finishing 13th and missing the finals.

2A girls 100 meter hurdles

SCA's Pearson fell .05 seconds short of qualifying for the finals. The freshman ran a 17.72 in the event to take 11th place.

4A girls 200 meter

Huth and Martinez didn't qualify for the finals in the 200. Huth ran a 26.46 while Martinez finished in 26.67.

4A girls discus

Pueblo West sophomore Sway Yates took 13th place in the discus after missing out on the finals. Her best throw was 93-0.

Girls 4x800 relay

Pueblo West's foursome finished 11th in the Class 4A field with a time of 10:11.93.

Rye also put its 4x800 girls relay team into the 2A field, and the Thunderbolts took 13th with a time of 11:33.39.

2A boys triple jump

SCA's Colby Roberts took 9th place in the Class 2A boys triple jump with a leap of 39-4.25. Roberts is the first Spartan to place in a boys event at state in program history.

2A girls triple jump

Pearson finished her day for the Spartans with an eighth place finish in the triple jump, posting a top jump of 33-5.5. Pearson is only the second girls Spartan athlete to place in a state track and field event in school history.

Chieftain senior sports reporter Jeff Letofsky can be reached by email at jletofsky@chieftain.com or on Twitter @jeffletofsky