May 20, 2017 5 min read

BALDWIN – Ashley McIntosh will tell you she is not the fastest hurdler, nor the strongest. She’s not even the most experienced, taking up the high and intermediates just last year.

What she is, though, is a WPIAL champion.

The senior from California High School used every bit of her ability and energy to capture the 300-meter hurdles title in Class AA at the WPIAL Track & Field Championship at Baldwin High School Thursday afternoon.

“I’m more of a middle-distance runner,” McIntosh said. “I’m not the fastest runner out there so I do a lot mid-distance running and that helps me out a lot. Plus, I run the 100 hurdles so my technique over the hurdle is better than someone who doesn’t run it.”

McIntosh had the motivation, placing sixth in last year’s WPIAL Championships and missing qualifying for the state tournament by one-tenth of a second.

“I told myself that when that happened, it wasn’t going to happen again,” she said. “When the WPIALs were over, I went back out to the track and trained every day since, until today.”

McIntosh said she always wanted to try hurdles but didn’t believe she would be good enough, so she “pushed it off to the side.

“Then I thought I’d give it a try but my coach said I would have to break the school record if I wanted to run hurdles,” she said.

“I never wanted to run hurdles before so he said, ‘Why do you want to run them now?’ So on my first try, I missed the school record by one-tenth of a second.”

They found a spot for her in the hurdles.

They didn’t come into the meet with the best time – three schools were faster – but Fort Cherry High School’s 1,600-relay team knew this important secret: seed times don’t win races.

So, the Rangers sliced nearly six seconds from their seed time of 4:16.05 to win the Class AA race by more than a second over Ellwood City.

The team of McKenzie Faure, Katrina Lepro, Alex Guerra and Bri Daniels turned in a 4:10.53.

“I’ve been running the relay here and this is the first time we made it this far,” said Daniels, a junior. “I’m so excited.”

Faure said clean handoffs were the key.

“We set it up for what we needed it to be to be,” said Faure. “We got to where we got because we did it together.”

The only keepsake South Fayette’s Sam Snodgrass had after last year’s WPIAL Championship was a broken arm he needed to provide attention to for months.

Snodgrass’ experience participating for a spot in the state meet couldn’t go anywhere but up after last year’s fall.

Grimacing down the final leg of the 1,600-meter run, Snodgrass would have had to look behind him to find the next closest competitor.

“Coming down the final 100 meters, I thought how cool it was going to be to be a WPIAL champion,” Snodgrass said.

He could have taken that quick glimpse as a late-charging effort from New Castle’s Le’Shawn Huff was enough to catch Snodgrass steps away from the finish line, leaving the South Fayette junior settling for second place (4:24.34).

“I’m really happy I was able to get out there and run my hardest,” Snodgrass said about qualifying. “I just didn’t have my kick at the end. I’m still satisfied.”

Wash High’s Isaiah Robinson and Fort Cherry’s Devon Brown are ending their busy athletic careers at Shippensburg University after winning places in the Class AA triple jump and javelin, respectively.

Robinson, who failed to qualify in the long and high jumps, was successful in his final event with a distance of 46-07.50.

“I just can’t wait to get to states and go right back at it with him,” Robinson said about Anthony Milliner of New Brighton, who finished in first place. “We’ve had a rivalry. It’s going to take some work but I will focus on doing it this week.”

Brown is making his second appearance at the state meet, looking to better his mark of 166-02 Thursday and a finish in Shippensburg last year he wasn’t thrilled about.

“I’m not mad about it,” Brown said. “I’m not happy about it either. If I could crack the top eight this year, it would be amazing. I think it’s realistic to medal.”

It was a bittersweet moment at Baldwin for Peters Township pole vaulter Anthony Wells.

Wells, who tied for seventh place, broke his previous personal record by eight inches with a vault of 13-09.

“Obviously, it’s always good to set a personal record,” Wells said.

“We practice Saturday and only got off the ground once. Monday’s practice is when it really started clicking going into this meet. It’s hard for me to be unhappy.”

With the vault, Wells moved into the second-highest spot in school history.