Perfect day for Fanella

Huntley's Amy Fanella glides over the last hurdle in the 100 meter hurdles during the Fox Valley Conference Girls Track and Field Meet at Crystal Lake Central High School. Fanella won the race in 15.49. She also won the 300 low hurdles, triple jump and anchored the Red Raiders' winning 4x400 relay team. (Lauren M. Anderson - landerson@nwherald.com)

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CRYSTAL LAKE – Huntley’s Amy Fanella, Cary-Grove’s Kelly McCoy and McHenry’s Alex Friske tried to lighten one of the Fox Valley Conference Girls Track and Field Meet’s tensest moments.

The three shook hands in congratulations for a competitive 100-meter high hurdles race and waited a few anxious moments for a determination from Crystal Lake Central’s fully-automatic timing system to see who had won.

Fanella leaped into the air when she heard the news and practically skipped the entire 100 meters back down the track in celebration. She won in 15.49, Friske (15.50) was second and McCoy (15.54), the race’s defending champion, was third. The win put Fanella in position for four first places, which she accomplished by later winning the 300 low hurdles, triple jump and by anchoring Huntley’s victorious 4x400 relay.

C-G easily took its second consecutive team championship with 142 points.

Huntley (91) was second and McHenry (79) was third. It was C-G’s fifth FVC title in 10 years.

Fanella had not been able to beat McCoy in the high hurdles in last year’s FVC Meet or in the past two McHenry County Meets.

“My coaches told me to go out and have fun and try your best,” Fanella said. “I knew Kelly and I would be neck and neck. I thought [Friske] beat me there. I wanted to walk away with four firsts. I’m most excited about the high hurdles.”

Two of the meet’s other individual standouts were Woodstock junior Kayla Beattie and McHenry junior Ashley Conway, who each won two individual events. Beattie won the 3,200 and 1,600, both in record times, while Conway repeated as champion in the high and long jumps.

Beattie blew away the 3,200 record held by Woodstock’s Katie Hartmann (11:02.3) from the 2000 meet with a time of 10:35.06. She came back in the 1,600 with a 5:05.55 to beat Crystal Lake South’s Marianne Collard’s record (5:08.30) set last year. Collard was runner-up in the 1,600 to Beattie.

“I didn’t know what the records were, I just came in with my own race plan and stuck with it,” said Beattie, who ran faster second halves in both races. “Our coaches [Bill Macaulay and Matt McCulley] have given us a great calendar for running. We’ve been training through most meets and now the intensity is the same, but we’re dropping reps. Our legs are starting to feel fresher.”

Conway outdueled Cary-Grove’s Carly Loeffel to reclaim her high jump title. Both athletes cleared 5-4, but Conway had one less miss than Loeffel (at 5-2) to give her the win.

“I like jumping against her, it makes you push harder,” Conway said. “We were running into the wind and it was cold, so I think it was a decent height. When it’s warmer your muscles get warmer.”

C-G dominated the sprints, taking first and second in the 100 (Sarah Ryan and Loeffel), first and second in the 200 (Anne McGarrigle and Ryan), first in the 400 (Loeffel), first in the 4x200 and second in the 4x100. The Trojans had seconds from Loeffel (high jump), Lindsay Young (800), Jessica Warnecke (300 hurdles) and Beth Somers (long jump).

“We have some horses,” C-G’s smiling coach Mark Anderson said. “I’ve been lucky. The girls really showed up and competed. The conference is always special because it’s about team. Next week at sectional, qualifying as many for state as possible will be a priority. We’re so deep though, I don’t know what I’ll change.”