Rockets rise up at Howard Wood Relays

Eight New Rockford-Sheyenne athletes competed at the 98th annual Howard Wood Dakota Relays meet at Howard Wood Field in Sioux Falls, South Dakota on May 5-6.

Those eight athletes were Trevor Waldo, Kelsie Belquist, Connor Knatterud, Porter Granger, Easton Benz, Ava Peterson, Emmie Belquist and Jaida Schumacher.

Over 3,000 athletes from around the midwest competed at the meet. Head coach, Elliott Belquist said, "It was a great overall experience that we will most definitely do again. It's like being at a state meet, athletes need to watch the schedule, warm-up on their own and prepare to go against great competition. It was very exciting seeing performances put together against a high-level competition. I love seeing our kids pushed to their max and how they handle adversity."

On the first day of the meet, Kelsie Belquist made history. In the first heat of the first event – the girls' 100-meter hurdles – Belquist set the meet record with a time of 14.40 seconds to take first in the prelims. In the 98 years of this meet, no one has set a record in the first event.

Following the meet, K. Belquist said "It was shocking when I heard that I got the record on my first run for the 100 hurdles, I was not expecting that."

Belquist then moved on to the semifinals of the 100-meter hurdles to take second place behind Bariborve Deebom of Fargo Davies with a time of 14.66 seconds.

Back at the 2022 State Track meet in Bismarck, both Belquist and Deebom received the state champion title in many events, along with breaking several records. Both Belquist and Deebom took state champion titles specifically in the 100-meter hurdles, with Belquist in Class B and Deebom in Class A.

In the 100-meter hurdles finals at Howard Wood Field, Belquist and Deebom were neck and neck.

"I was scared but I also knew that if I doubted myself, I might as well just not run it," said K. Belquist about her thoughts as the race got underway. "I talked myself up and just had confidence going in. During the race, I could tell I was slightly behind but at the end I just gave myself one last push and it worked!"

With three hundredths of a second to spare, Belquist had beaten Deebom to take first place by breaking her own record she set on Friday morning, with a time of 14.26 seconds.

Two events were "invite only" for the meet, with those being the 200-meter dash and the 800-meter run. Belquist was personally invited to compete in the special 200-meter dash. "I was very thankful that I was invited to the special. I was glad there were other girls in the race that I knew. It made the race more comfortable," stated Belquist.

Belquist was found competing alongside Deebom yet again, and another familiar face, Elise Wisnewski of Central Cass.

Belquist and Wisnewski competed alongside one another at the 2022 Class B State Track Meet in the 200-meter dash. Belquist took first place with a time of 24.63 seconds and Wisnewski followed in second place with a time of 25.10 seconds.

But the results from this special 200-meter dash were the opposite. In first place was Deebom with a time of 24.39 seconds, followed by Wisnewski in second with a time of 24.62 and Belquist in third place with a time of 24.83 seconds.

Belquist also broke the meet record in the 300-meter hurdles that was set back in 1993, with a time of 42.87 seconds. Belquist received first place in the 300-meter hurdles overall. Belquist's sister, Emmie, also competed in the 300-meter hurdles where she placed 50th with a time of 50.48 seconds.

E. Belquist ran a personal record time of 1:03.21 in the girls' 400-meter dash to take 51st place overall.

Peterson, Schumacher, E. Belquist and K. Belquist ran alongside 23 other teams in the girls' 4x100-meter relay. The girls' relay came up 16-hundredths of a second short of first place with a time of 51.16 seconds. Although the girls took second place in the event, the Rockets beat a New Rockford-Sheyenne school record with their time. Nicole Lange, Heather Taverna, Rachel Otto and Bobbi Boyle set the girls' 4x100-meter relay record back in 1992 with a time of 51.70 seconds.

Peterson also competed in the girls' javelin event. Peterson threw a personal record of 109 feet flat to take 19th place.

The four boys – Porter Granger, Trevor Waldo, Easton Benz and Connor Knatterud – made up the boys' relay teams.

In the 4x200-meter relay, the Rockets took seventh place overall with a time of 1:35.16. With this time, the boys' relay team qualified for the Class B State Track meet on May 25-27. Way to go boys!

The Rockets' relay team took fourth place in the 4x100-meter relay with a time of 45.16 seconds.

Knatterud also competed in the boys' 100-meter dash among 60 other athletes and finished in 50th place with a time of 11.48 seconds.

Coach Belquist stated, "The season is winding down and we are gearing up for a run at individuals making their last efforts of qualifying for the state meet. We have five relays in up to this point, so that is awesome to see. Individuals have really stepped up this last week to give themselves a chance of qualifying by meeting the standard. Will be a fun couple of weeks to see who steps up and goes after those marks."

The NR-S varsity track team is set to compete in the Panther Booster in Rugby on Monday, May 15, followed by the North Central Region Meet, also in Rugby, on Friday, May 19. These will be the final meets before the Class B State Track meet on May 25-27.