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Hadden, Bailey rise to the top

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In an area with more than one solid track and field team, choosing a male and female track and field athlete of the year is no easy task.

The dominating performances of Spaulding junior Kelcie Bailey and U-32 senior Lucas Hadden, however, shouted – not spoke – for themselves.

Bailey, a sprint specialist who also plays soccer and competes in indoor track, won the 400-meter dash at the Division I state championships and set a school record in doing so with a time of 57.93 seconds.

At one point at the end of the season, she broke the school record three weekends in a row.

"Her level of competition at Division I is a lot harder, and when she was in the meets we saw her in, she was pretty dominant," U-32 coach Mark Chaplin said.

Bailey won the 200-meter dash at this year's Essex Invitational and finished 11th (25.97) in the 200 at the New England championships. She was second in the 200 at the state meet, running it in 26.04 seconds.

"She was injured part of the year but still finished first or second in every race she ran," Spaulding coach Brad Bessette said. "She has a lot of talent and she's a hard worker in practice. She's well-liked by the other kids and shows a lot of leadership. When she says stuff the kids listen to her."

Bailey also ran on the 4x100-meter and 4x400-meter relay teams for Spaulding and competes in the summer for a club program out of Burlington along with Crimson Tide teammate Catie White.

"She probably got into track for training for soccer, she's a very good soccer player," Bessette said of Bailey. "She was looking for something to do in the spring."

While Bailey will return for her senior season next spring, Hadden will begin his collegiate track and field career in Winston-Salem, N.C., at Wake Forest University.

Hadden will join the Demon Deacons after breaking his own javelin records several times. At the New England qualifier meet at Essex he was named the Vermont Field Athlete of the Meet after winning both the javelin and the discus by a wide margin. Hadden won the discus by 24 feet, 4 inches and the javelin by 3 feet, 2 inches.

Hadden also finished second in the 100-meter dash in the Division II state championships with a time of 11.89 seconds. His furthest javelin throw sailed 193 feet, 7 inches.

"He was the star of track and field at U-32 for the last four years," Chaplin said. "He won jav all four years – he works year-round at it. He spends the winter in the weight room and spends the summer going to high-level competition and plays football as well. He really works at it very hard. He got quite a bit stronger this year and did a little bit of indoor track, too."

Hadden's father was also a javelin thrower and Chaplin said the elder Hadden has been coaching Lucas since he was young.

EAST MONTPELIER – U-32's Lucas Hadden stole the individual spotlight at Wednesday's Monster Meet, but Harwood's strength in numbers gave the Highlander boys and girls decisive victories in the team scores.

Harwood coach Taggert Haslam couldn't identify any one person who stood out and guided the team to an 88-point girls victory and a 143-point victory on the boys' side. Instead, Haslam called it a team victory. The U-32 boys and girls both picked up second place, scoring 115 and 131 points, respectively. Peoples Academy (79 points) took third on the girls' side, South Royalton (52 points) finished fourth and Spaulding finished fifth (49 points). Whitcomb and Northfield tied for sixth place with 11 points and Randolph finished last with four points.

On the boys' side, Spaulding finished third behind U-32 with 86 points, South Royalton took fourth with 47 points and Northfield and Peoples tied for fifth place with eight points apiece. Whitcomb finished seventh with four points.

The usual Harwood standouts such as Eamon Welter (first in 1,500-meter and 800-meter races) and Sophie Lisaius (first in the 1,500 and second in 800) were on top of their games to deliver valuable points for the team. But Harwood's biggest edge didn't come from sweeping all of the first-place finishes. The real secret to the Highlanders' success was having multiple athletes score in almost every event. For example, Harwood racked up 17 points alone in the boys 300-meter hurdles as Zach Pfister took first, Dylan Peterson finished second and Josh Kernan placed third.

"It hasn't really been just one person who has stood out – it has been across the board," Haslam said. "We did great in distance and our 4x100 teams both won today and really did an excellent job. It has been a real group effort today. We are getting the great results we always get from our 1-2 finishers that we always get, but we are having people score in the fourth, fifth and sixth spots. It is great and that gap between those two groups is getting closer. It just elevates where the team is."

Hadden was a shining star for U-32, winning all four of his events and breaking the state record in javelin. The Raider senior won the 100, 200 and discus. He broke his own Division II state record of 181 feet, 11 inches in the javelin with a throw of 183 feet, 9 inches.

"I look at javelin as my main event – anything else I do is to train for it," Hadden said. "I'll run the 100 and 200, but it is just to get into better shape."

Hadden's four wins didn't come easy for the Wake Forrest-bound senior as Harwood's Thomas Jacobs-Moore nearly edged out Hadden in the 200. However, Hadden beat the Highlander sprinter to the line by eight-hundredths of a second.

"Luke is an incredible athlete," U-32 coach Mark Chaplin said. "He is a hard worker and it is paying off."

U-32's Amy Curtis picked a win in the 3,000, while teammate Chelsea Evans won the 800, placed second in the long jump and ran the fastest leg on the winning 4x800 relay. Esther Nemethy placed well for U-32, taking second in the triple jump and pole vault and third in the long jump. She was also on the second-place 4x100 relay team.

Montpelier's Colby Cunningham won the triple jump by almost 2 feet.