NEENAH (NBC 26) — The state track meet gets underway in La Crosse on Friday, and for one Neenah High School relay group, they’re hitting their stride at the right time.
“Coach has been telling us since the start, we just have a great group of guys and he’s like we got a great opportunity to do well this year and make it to state with a solid group,” said senior Ethan Snider.
The Rockets 4x200 boys relay team came into the season confident that they could make some noise. The team is made up of seniors Jase Jenkins, Jack Zemlock, Ethan Snider and sophomore Grant Dean.
“[At the] start of the year we were kind of looking at that record board and we were like some of these we can knock down,” Snider said.
All four of them played on the football team last season, so they’re pretty close, but their bond has only grown.
“This has been like a different kind [of bond], when you’re in the same race as each other, you rely on each other heavily,” said senior Jack Zemlock. “It comes down to you four, that’s all it is. You can’t rely on someone else. When it’s your leg you gotta go. So it’s been cool to bond with them in that way.”
For Zemlock, he had never been on a track and field team until this year…His football teammates convinced him to join the team.
“Just seeing how much fun my guys had at state [last year] and them telling me all the fun experiences with track, I just really wanted to experience that, so I figured it’s one last ride, might as well see how it goes,” he said.
He received hand-me-down spikes from Snider before the season began.
“I didn’t buy these shoes or anything, I was like you know what I will just have fun and kind of took off once we got [to] outdoor season and decided to focus more on it and now we’re here,” said Zemlock.
The team had some hiccups early on but they have been getting better and better every meet.
"The past three meets, we PR’d like every time and it’s super exciting,” said Jase Jenkins. “I’m super excited we’re going to see what we can get on Friday and hopefully Saturday.”
Their latest PR last week (1:29.33), broke the school's 4x200 record set 43 years ago in1980 (1:29.50).
“Grant [Dean] crossing the finish line, he didn’t even know what the time was, he just knew it felt good and stuck his arms up in there and was like oh, we did it and it was just a great feeling,” said Snider.
“It was super exciting because it was a goal, we knew we had a chance to get like two months ago so every practice we were trying to reach that goal step by step so it was really fun to finally get it.,” said Jenkins.
And now with their week-by-week improvement, they have their eyes set on the podium.
“The outcomes going to be what it’s going to be, but I think we could PR at state and hoping to get to Saturday and we can show up and PR some great numbers,” said Zemlock.
