RUNNING : Hammer Thrower Makes a 1st Impression

Watching Antelope Valley College’s Larry Johnston warm up for the hammer throw at the state track and field championships at Sacramento City College on May 17, one never would have guessed that he would throw 199 feet 1 inch to win the event.

After all, Johnston slipped and fell twice during warm-ups, once landing on his hands and knees so hard that Marauder Coach Mark Covert thought he had seriously hurt himself.

“I was a little worried about him when that happened,” Covert said. “But to be honest with you, his warm-ups were pretty typical. He’s being doing that all season.”

Although Johnston is 26 years old, he is a relative novice in the hammer.

A football player and half-miler at Lincoln High in Des Moines, Iowa, Johnston graduated in 1983 and worked as an audit supervisor for a hotel chain before moving to California in 1988 because he wanted to work toward a degree in exercise physiology.

He enrolled at Moorpark College in the fall of 1989, was introduced to the hammer throw by Raider assistant John Keever in the spring of 1990, and threw 163 feet to win the Western State Conference title.

He transferred to Antelope Valley last summer for personal reasons and has continued to improve.

“I still don’t know what I’m really doing in the event,” said Johnston, who is being recruited by Oregon, Washington, Washington State and USC. “I’m at the stage right now where I hit it right or I don’t hit it at all.”

And what about those nasty falls in warm-ups that have become his trademark?

“That’s just something I seem to have to do,” Johnston quipped. “But it’d be nice if I could get that out of my system.”

Room for improvement: Angela Arrington of Antelope Valley won the women’s discus and placed fifth in the shotput at the state junior college meet, but Covert insists that the freshman from Palmdale High could improve dramatically if she were more consistent in workouts.

“Angie has a lot of talent, but she is lazy with a capital L,” Covert said. “She’s a legend in the Antelope Valley because of her success in high school, but she could throw much further if I could just get her to work out from September through the end of the season.”

Quotable: Advantage Athletics Coach Charlie DiMarco, who was at the state junior college meet because two of the athletes he coaches--Melanie Clarke and Jennifer Stewart of Valley College--were competing, said that although Arrington was involved in the shotput and discus, she wasn’t committed to it.

DiMarco explained the difference between involved and committed in the following manner.

“Take your standard bacon-and-egg breakfast,” DiMarco said. “The chicken is involved in it, but the pig is committed.”

NCAA watch: Darcy Arreola of Cal State Northridge will lead a contingent of four Matador athletes who will compete in the NCAA Division I track and field championships at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore., starting today.

Arreola, who finished third in the women’s 1,500 meters at the 1989 Division I meet before redshirting last season, will run in a qualifying heat of that event today.

Kevin Hendrix, Tyrone Jeffries and Charlotte Vines will run in heats of the men’s 100, men’s 110-meter high hurdles, and the women’s 100.

Big-time difference: If one is curious about the qualitative differences between the Division I and Division II levels in track and field, consider this year’s Cal State Northridge team.

The Matador men and women, who placed second and fifth in last year’s Division II championships, posted a combined total of three automatic and six provisional qualifying marks for the Division I meet this season.

The same two teams would have had 23 automatic and 23 provisional qualifiers at the Division II level.

Prediction time: Marion Jones of Rio Mesa High has been picked to finish ninth in the 200 meters at The Athletics Congress championships by Track & Field News magazine in its latest issue.

Jones, who will attempt to successfully defend her titles in the 100 and 200 at the state championships at Cerritos College starting Friday, has qualified for the TAC meet in the 100 (11.28 seconds), 200 (22.87) and 400 (52.91), but will only run the two shorter sprints in New York, June 12-15.

The top three finishers in each event will qualify for the U. S. team which will compete in the World Championships in Tokyo, Aug. 24-31.

Downward trend: The quality of track and field performances among City Section high schools continues to plummet--especially in the technical events--as evidenced by the results of last Thursday’s City championships at Birmingham High.

With the top four finishers in each event advancing to the state championships, the once-proud City will send some less-than-spectacular athletes to the state meet.

Here is a sample of some of the qualifying marks of City athletes:

* In boys’ events, 39.99 in the 300-meter intermediate hurdles, 20-4 in the long jump and 43-4 1/2 in the triple jump.

* In the girls’ events, 12 minutes 5.53 seconds in the 3,200 meters, 15.80 in the 100-meter low hurdles, and 4-10 in the high jump.

* The inferiority of those marks really becomes evident when compared to marks of Southern Section athletes who failed to qualify for state at the Masters meet.

* In the boys’ events: 38.47 in the 300 hurdles, 22-1 3/4 in the long jump, and 46-10 3/4 in the triple jump. In the girls’ events: 10:51.77 in the 3,200, 14.64 in the 100 hurdles, and 5-4 in the high jump.