After a month of practice, the track team is preparing for its first meet March 31 at Clearwater High School.

Student athletes go out for track for the competition, as a way to stay in shape, or to hang out with their friends, head track coach Brent Martens said. Students who go out for track work with Matt Biehler for throwing events, Fred Cottrell for sprinting and high jump and Justin Regehr for long distance and sand jump. As well as being the head track coach, Coach Martens is also the coach of pole vault and hurdles.

For Coach Cottrell, this is his last year coaching at CSHS, including track. Coach Cottrell has been a track coach for more than 50 years.

“It will be sad to see him go, as he does numerous things to make my job easier,” Coach Martens said. “To lose that many years of knowledge and experience will be hard to replace.”

Besides competing against other teams, students are also competing against themselves to improve and beat their own records.

“I’m looking forward to beating my PR (personal record) in javelin,” sophomore Alivia Lange said. “It is 100 feet.”

Some other athletes are looking ahead to the end of the season when considering their goals.

“My goal is first at State in shot put,” junior Matthew Lange said, “and to beat Aaron May in javelin.”