Monday, May 18, 1998

40th Hawaii High School
Athletic Association
Track and Field Meet

Records made state
track special

By Pat Bigold
Star-Bulletin

Al Rowan coached 21 state champions at Punahou and has never missed a state track and field meet since they were inaugurated in 1959.

So, when Rowan pronounced last week's 40th Hawaii High School Athletic Association meet ''the best ever," you have to believe it.

''In terms of performance and atmosphere, it was the best," said Rowan.

Indeed, it was a state meet for the ages.

Records were broken 14 times in 10 events at the Kaiser High track -- six in Thursday's trials and eight in front of a crowd of over 3,000 in Saturday's finals.

Records in five events were wind-aided.

And no one, not even Rowan, could recall when three local track athletes made the nation take notice of their achievements in the same season.

Punahou junior Eri Macdonald dug herself firmly into the No. 2 spot in the nation at 800 meters a couple of months ago with a surprising 2:10.4 performance in a California meet.

But over the weekend, Castle's Bryan Clay and Kaiser's Endia Abrante joined her in the national lists.

Clay set wind-aided state meet records in four events -- a one-day performance Rowan said he's never witnessed before.

The Castle senior entered the nation's top 15 with a 24-foot, 6-1/2-inch long jump, and the nation's top 20 with a 13.90 time in the 110-meter high hurdles.

His 10.52 in the 100 and his 21.41 in the 200 place him in the nation's top 50 and 60, respectively.

''He's certainly got to be one of the finest young male athletes to ever come out of Hawaii," said Jack Shepard, who has compiled boys' prep results for Track and Field News magazine since the 1970s.

Abrante's 54.41 time in the 400 meters was the most stunning individual record. It put her solidly into fourth place in the nation, according to Track and Field News girls' editor Mike Kennedy.

Abrante broke a two-decade-old mark in the 400 at last year's state meet with a 56.11 clocking, then broke that with a 56.01 at Thursday's state trials.

Abrante had to bring home the record against the wind.

''I leaned into the wind this time," said Abrante, who criticized herself on Thursday for failing to do so. ''I escaped it this time."

But Abrante said she couldn't have broken 55 seconds if it had not been for her friend and rival Macdonald. ''There's no way I would've been able to run a time like that without Eri pushing me," she said.

Macdonald finished second in a personal record of 56.71.

Mark Stream, the women's sprint coach at Oregon who recruited Abrante, said, ''I tell you, we could use her in the 4x400 right now."

Stream said that Abrante's time would be the second fastest on his Ducks women's squad this season.

Abrante also had two wind-aided victories. She broke Erin Stovall's (Iolani) 1997 record (24.60) in the 200 meters with a time of 24.44, and she captured the 100 in 12.20, missing Stovall's record by .11 second.

Macdonald broke a 14-year-old record in the 800 with a time of 2:13:23 on Thursday and then captured the 800 final on Saturday in a more comfortable 2:22.03 to help the Punahou girls win their third straight state title, 23rd overall.

She also came from well behind in the anchor leg of the 4x400 to win for Punahou. It was the second year in a row that Macdonald has sealed the event that way. In 1997 she helped Punahou set the meet record of 4:03.32.

Kamehameha was second to the Buffanblu girls with 39.75 points.

On the boys' side, senior Bennett Valencia's two come-from-behind performances in the anchor legs of the 4x100 and 4x400 relays gave Punahou 20 critical points.

The Buffanblu were able to win their third straight team title (25th overall) with 42 points -- one of the lowest winning point totals.

The importance of Valencia's anchor runs was reflected in the scores of the teams that finished behind Punahou: St. Anthony (25), Castle (24), Iolani (22.50), Kamehameha (22) and Radford (20).

"It's an incredible feat for his team," said Dacre Bowen, who coached his fourth boys' title in seven years.

Valencia was instrumental in providing Punahou with 29 of its points overall. He missed breaking his 1997 state meet record in the 400 (48.66) because he was holding back for the all-important relays.

Valencia did, however, give Punahou its only individual first-place medal by winning the 400 in 48.73. He also finished third behind Clay in the record 200.

Other record-breakers on Saturday were surprising Kahuku freshman Natasha Kai with a 45.37 in the 300-meter low hurdles and Mid-Pacific's Kris Cuaresma-Primm, who high jumped 6-09.