Two speedy senior runners for the Yorktown Patriots recently added indoor track and field state championships to what already included a list of significant accomplishments during different 2021-22 high-school seasons.
Owen McArdle won the boys 3,200-meters state title in 9:20.09 at the Virginia High School League’s Class 6 indoor state track and field meet in Virginia Beach. The state title was his second of the school year.
“I ran relaxed the first mile and was able to get the lead and control of the race with 800 to go,” said McArdle, who will run in college at the University of Virginia. “In big races like that all you focus on is winning, not a time.”
By running the anchor leg, McArdle also helped the Yorktown boys 4×800 relay place second in the state in 7:55.99, a school record by nine seconds. Lucas Keith, Jack Levine and Jack Blocher also ran on that relay.
Days after the state meet, McArdle placed 26th in the two-mile in 9:11 at the New Balance national high-school meet in New York City. The Yorktown 4×800 relay finished 10th in that meet.
During the fall, McArdle won numerous cross country races, including region and Class 6 state crowns. He then placed fifth at the South Region championships, then 28th in the national meet.
In the girls Class 6 state indoor track and field meet, Yorktown’s Anna Corcoran was a big standout, wining the 1,600-meters in 4:59.21 and finishing third in the 1,000 (2:58.86). Days later, at the New Balance national meet, she finished 11th in the mile in a school-record 4:50.43.
Back in the fall, Corcoran finished fourth in the girls Class 6 state cross country meet after finishing third in district and region meets and winning the Arlington County championship.
Corcoran will run in college at Duke University.
Also for the Yorktown girls at the state indoor track and field meet, Victorie Klepetkova was second in the high jump at 5-4, Alma de Migue was seventh in the 55 dash and 11th in the 300, and the 4×800 relay was fifth.
The Yorktown girls finished 10th in the team scoring.
Also in the girls state meet, Wakefield’s Kathryn Coggins was 12th in the high jump.
McArdle’s effort – along with an eighth in the 1,600 by Keith, a ninth in the 3,200 by Levine and a 12th in the 1,000 by Blocher – helped the Yorktown boys finish fifth.
Wakefield’s Justin Delgado placed fifth in the boys pole vault at 12-6.
Washington-Liberty’s Zemeron Bein was sixth in the boys high jump (6-0), Jonah Friedman finished seventh in the boys shot put (47-8 3/4) and Erik Bird was 17th in the boys 1,000.
NOTE: In recent weeks, McArdle was chosen as the 2021-22 Gatorade Virginia Boys Cross Country Player of the Year.