The Arcadia Invitational, held Friday and Saturday in Los Angeles, is kind of a big deal.
“It’s like high school Olympics,” said Durango High School senior Shane Bisogno, son of Arlene and Joe Bisogno.
DHS head coach David McMillan is bringing 12 athletes to one of the biggest high school meets in the country to show them what track and field looks like performed at the highest level and to prove that they can compete there, too.
The Demons’ 12 athletes will compete in at least eight events and are the alternates for one other event.
“Within that spectrum, they belong,” McMillan said. “We’re not in the elite category, but we have kids that belong in those events.”
The Arcadia Invitational sets minimum standards for all of its events.
Teams submit results to the meet, and after that, Arcadia officials whittle down the entrants to the cream of the crop. Then, the officials will break its accepted entrants down into four categories: invitational, open, rated and seeded.
Durango’s boys 4x800-meter relay of Trent Andrews, Joe Crawford, Alastair McMillan and Garrett Mulkey qualified for the invitational level, which is the most competitive.
“I think we’re pretty lucky,” said Alastair McMillan, son of Heidi McMillan and the coach. “Not a lot of schools from Colorado get to go to a meet this big.”
DHS also qualified its 4x400-meter relay team of Bisogno, Devin Lewis, Justin Marcum and David Moenning and its 1,600 sprint medley relay of Andrews, Bisogno, Lewis and Moenning.
Lewis made the cut individually in the 200-meter run, while Marcum also will compete in the pole vault.
“It shows that we’re not a one-person team,” said Andrews – son of Alan and Nancy Andrews – of Durango’s depth at the meet.
Alli Davis, Miranda Gallegos, Shannon Maloney and Gabi Razma will run the girls 4x400-meter relay and are an alternate for the 1,600 sprint medley relay.
Three of them have qualified for individual events, as well: Davis will compete in the long jump, Shannon Maloney the 800-meter run and Gabi Razma the triple jump.
The relay events and some field events will take place Friday, while the invitational’s individual events, open field events and open running events all will take place Saturday.
Coach McMillan plans for his team to watch the sections of events that they didn’t have team members qualify for.
“It’s inspirational to them, and I think it makes them realize we’re not far off some of those performances,” he said. “It benefits seeing the kids perform way up there and realize we’re not far off.”
As with the cross country team’s trip to the Stanford Invitational in the fall, coach McMillan has planned the Demons’ trip to L.A. as a cultural experience, as well.
They’ll visit the Santa Anita race track, which boasts a life-size statue of the famous racehorse Seabiscuit.
“I always tell the story to the kids of Seabiscuit, the little horse that could,” coach McMillan said. “It wasn’t supposed to do what it did because it was two ends short and barrel-chested and cross-legged and stuff.”
The team also will go to the beach at Santa Monica Pier.
“It’s a treat for Colorado kids,” said Crawford, son of Rick and Jackie Crawford.
Ultimately, though, the trip is about attending a track meet.
A really big, important track and field meet that can help put the rest of the Demons’ season in perspective.
“It helps us keep our calm at state and other places where there’s a lot going on at one time,” said Razma, daughter of Ed and Kristina Razma.
kgrabowski@durangoherald.com
