All Is Well for Carroll, Who Advances to State

If you’re going to get sick during the track and field season, it’s best to do it during the early or middle part.

Doing it at the end can be fatal to your chances of advancing to the state championships.

Porchea Carroll of Rio Mesa High learned that lesson the hard way last year when an illness slowed her to a pair of ninth-place finishes in the girls’ 100 and 200 meters in the Southern Section Masters Meet six days after she won Division II titles in both events in the section championships.

Carroll, a sophomore, exorcised the ghosts of those performances Friday by winning the 100 in a wind-aided 11.51, finishing third in the long jump with a wind-aided 18-6 3/4 and placing fourth in the 200 in a wind-aided 23.81 in the Masters Meet at Cerritos College.

The top five finishers in each event advanced to the state championships at Hughes Stadium in Sacramento on June 4-5.

“I just wanted to concentrate,” Carroll said of the 100. “That was one thing I didn’t do well last week. I didn’t concentrate during the race like I should have.”

Carroll, second to senior Latrice Borders of Long Beach Wilson in the Division I final of the section championships, got off to a solid start Friday, drew even with first-place Tracee Thomas of Riverside J.W. North at the midway point and powered away from her in the last 30 meters.

Thomas, a freshman, clocked 11.58, with freshman Angel Perkins of Cerritos Gahr third in 11.69.

“She didn’t get out like she can,” assistant coach Brian FitzGerald of Rio Mesa said about Carroll. “But she’s getting stronger and stronger in the last part of her race.”

Carroll, senior Annmarie Turpin of Simi Valley, senior Lauren Fleshman of Canyon and junior Rodney Woods of Littlerock each won events Friday and junior Josh Spiker of Ventura turned in a superb nonwinning effort.

Turpin, who has signed with UC Irvine, won the girls’ high jump with a school-record and yearly state-leading mark of 5-10 1/2.

The Stanford-bound Fleshman, the national leader in the girls’ 3,200 at 10:21.36, won that event in 10:33.58 after running a 65.6 last 400 to pull away from sophomore Anita Siraki of Hoover, who finished second in 10:38.92.

Woods bounded a wind-aided 47-8 1/2 to win the triple jump on his sixth--and final--jump after being in third place with a 46-6 3/4 best after the fifth round.

Spiker ran a school-record 8:56.66 in the boys’ 3,200, the second-fastest outdoor time in the nation this year, but it left him second to junior Augie Escobar of Villa Park, who ran a nation-leading 8:56.23.

Spiker, who ran a then-school record of 9:04.04 in finishing second to Escobar in the Division II final last Saturday, led the field through the first 1,600 in 4:27.0 and clocked 5:36.2 at 2,000 meters and 6:44.9 at 2,400.

Escobar surged into the lead with 500 meters left, but Spiker stayed close to finish in a time that moved him to sixth on the all-time region list and to second on the all-time Ventura County list.

Junior Travis Johnson and sophomore Sierra Hauser-Price of Notre Dame, senior Tim Adrian of Moorpark and junior Oliver Jackson of Royal were some of the other qualifiers from the region.

Johnson placed third in the boys’ shotput in 58-1 and Hauser-Price finished fifth in the girls’ 100 in 11.84 and in the 200 in 24.06 to advance to the state championships for the second time in those events.

Adrian, fifth in the boys’ discus in the state championships last year, placed third with a throw of 177-4.

Jackson, the state leader in the boys’ long jump at 24-4 3/4, suffered his first defeat of the season, but advanced with a wind-aided 23-6 for fourth.

Senior Bridget Pearson of Hoover was a shocking nonqualifer in the girls’ pole vault.

Pearson, the 1997 state champion, failed to cleared the opening height of 10-6 after clearing a career-best 12-2 1/2 two weeks ago.