For the second year in a row, Dino Nadarevic established a new meet record at the South Fayette Invitational on April 26.
The Gateway senior throwing standout won the shot put with a top attempt of 58 feet, 4.5 inches, almost a foot further than the record 57-6 he tallied at South Fayette last year.
He bested runner-up Tyler Ondrusek, a senior from Central Valley, who threw 58-0. They both were four feet clear of the rest of the field.
It was another top mark in a strong final varsity season for Nadarevic who will be a favorite in both the shot and discus at the WPIAL championships May 14 at Slippery Rock.
Nadarevic set a school record in the discus at 172-5 in the season-opening dual meet against Hempfield and Connellsville and then tossed a 172-7 in winning the Tri-State Track Coaches Association title April 12.
He also claimed the discus title at South Fayette with a winning throw of 164-4, 10 feet better than runner-up Jonah Pfender, a senior from Fort Cherry (154-3).
Nadarevic hoped for big things when he and other Gateway athletes tested their mettle at the prestigious Baldwin Invitational last Friday at Baldwin High School.
Gateway athletes will have the chance to either qualify for WPIAL or improve their positions among the established qualifiers at last chance meets at either Norwin on Thursday (May 8) or West Mifflin on Friday (May 9).
Senior Austin Lockhart joined Nadarevic at the top of the medals podium at South Fayette with a winning leap of 43-8 in the triple jump, four inches further than his 43-4.5 in taking ninth at the Butler Invitational nine days earlier.
Lockhart’s season best of 44-1/4 came against Franklin Regional on April 16 at Gateway’s Antimarino Stadium.
He also took 12th in the long jump at 19-1.
Junior Aaron Staley also reached the awards podium with a fast run in the 100-meter dash.
He started out sixth after the prelims with a time of 11.21 seconds. He was slightly slower in the finals (11.34) but finished eighth overall out of 79 entered.
The 3,200 relay of Tashon Gowder, Michael Byrd, Robert Kennedy and Amir Timbo was 10th with a time of 9:27.09.
First-place finishes were not limited to the boys team at South Fayette as senior Taniya Denson continued a successful final varsity season with a victory in the pole vault. Her 10-9 was a personal record which surpassed the 10-7 she achieved in placing sixth at the Tri-State meet.
The Gateway girls also grabbed a pair of podium finishes on the track.
Sophomore Kalee Kellman recorded nearly identical times from the prelims to the finals of the 100 hurdles — 16.04 and then 16.07 — but she went from eighth after the prelims to a fifth-place medal in the finals.
Kellman hopes to get back down under 16 seconds in the 100 hurdles. She ran a personal best of 15.74 in the Gators’ section dual meet with Oakland Catholic on April 9.
The win helped Gateway defeat Oakland Catholic, 88-59, on the way to a 4-2 section record and a third-place finish behind Franklin Regional (6-0) and Plum (5-1).
Freshman Piper Munyon continues to move up the distance ranks in her first varsity track season. She picked up more positive results at South Fayette with a fifth-place finish in the 3,200 run in a personal best 11:49.62.