Mike Strom, The Times-Picayune , May 09, 2009 11:33 a.m.
BATON ROUGE &ndash At a school where football rules as king of all sports, the boys track program at South Plaquemines served notice of its presence by carving its own slice of athletic immortality on Friday night. Six athletes competing in eight events combined to record four individual first-place finishes, two relay victories, three second-place efforts and one third to score 90 points and nearly lap runner-up Southern Lab a second time in team scoring. “This is what these boys have been working hard for,’’ South Plaquemines Coach Cyril Crutchfield, who doubles as the school’s head football coach, said. “People talk about our football teams winning two straight state championships, but I’m more proud of this group (which is composed of all football players) than my football players. I look at them, they haven’t had a break. “They’ve been going at it non-stop. You’re talking about 15 grueling weeks of football. Then they jump into track. They’ve worked through the Mardi Gras holidays and the Easter break. They’re really worked hard.’’ Beau Fitte won the 110- and 300-meter hurdles, finished second in the triple jump and ran a leg on a record-setting 400-meter relay team to earn Outstanding Boys Performer honors for Class 1A and barely outdo fellow sophomore Bradley Sylve, who successfully defended his individual state titles in the 100 and 200 with times of 10.47 and 21.33 seconds respectively. Fitte, 6-feet-2, 215-pounds, won the hurdles races with respective times of 14.55 and 39.48 seconds after leaping a career best of 44 feet, 8 inches to finish second in the triple jump. Fitte also ran the second leg on South Plaquemines’ record setting 400 relay.
Beau Fitte, his older brother Lyle, Ridge Turner and Sylve combined to run their fastest time of the season at 41.77 seconds to eclipse the 2002 mark of 42.07 set by Mangham. Sylve ran anchor legs on both sprint relays in combining with Lyle Fitte, Mike Barthelemy and Turner to win the 800 relay in a time of 1:29.36. Turner finished second in the 110 hurdles behind Fitte and third in the 200 behind Sylve while Seth Ancar finished second in the javelin with a personal best toss of 163 feet, 4 inches. Ancar entered as a No. 5 seed.