Rayfield, May look forward to Waite track season

The Waite boys track team will have to replace the highly decorated Elias Valdez, who won the 800, the 1600, and the 3200 at the City League meet last year, while also being part of the 3200 relay team that finished second.

Head coach Grant Rayfield, who enters his fifth year as head coach of the boys program after three years as an assistant, said the team had some strong kids last year in addition to Valdez, but just didn’t have enough speed overall.

This year, Rayfield said his team’s strongest sprinter, Daveyon Holman, is back.

“He just keeps getting better,” Rayfield said. “He's a good, hard worker when it comes to practice.”

Also back is senior Angel Rodriguez, who is a distance runner and hurdler. Junior Oscar Valdez is another returning distance runner who also could see time in sprints.

“Those are both strong returners,” Rayfield said.

Damion Allen Jr., a junior thrower, is also back.

“I'm looking for that group to lead the practices, to be the example at our practices and our meets,” Rayfield said. “I'm looking forward to seeing them grow individually as athletes and as young men. I kind of lean a lot on those guys and they, for the most part, do exactly what needs to be done.”

Rayfield said the team has a lot of upperclassmen, and he’s looking forward to them stepping up and leading this year.

“I'm really excited to see how Damion throws, and I'm excited to see how Daveyon runs,” he said. “He didn't run last year, but I'm excited to see him back, and he's looking really, really good this year. We've picked up a couple of football players in the offseason to get them stronger for football season. I'm looking forward to seeing those guys get stronger and then push into the football season, which hopefully in turn will bring them around for track next year and can bring in more of the football players.”

With guys like Rodriguez and Oscar Valdez, Rayfield is looking forward to seeing how his distance team does this year.

“We had a pretty strong team last season for cross country,” he said. “Unfortunately, they're mostly juniors and seniors, but I think we should have a fairly strong distance portion of the team.”

Joelle Turner and Bobby Moton Jr. should also help in distance.

“Bobby was one of these guys last year that if we needed someone to run a relay, he was ready to hop in and do it,” Rayfield said. “No matter if he was fast enough or not, he was willing to jump in and give it a try, which was great last year.”

Younger guys such as sophomores Christian Hernandez and Kaiden Ferguson should find roles this year. Rayfield isn’t sure which events they’ll compete in, but Hernandez is more distance and Ferguson is potentially a sprinter and hurdler.

“I’m not 100 percent sure where they’re going to be, but I know they’re going to impact the team,” he said.

Another young guy, sophomore thrower Oziel Monjarez, should also make an impact. Rayfield coached his older brother several years ago.

“Hopefully he'll pick up where his brother left off,” he said. “He's got some muscle, and he looks ready to go and learn how to succeed.”

Overall, Rayfield said his younger guys have the ability to do good things.

“They're ready to learn, and they're working hard at practice and they're kind of seeing what the seniors and juniors are doing,” he said. “They're kind of plugging along, trying to keep up with them and kind of pushing the upperclassmen along to make them stronger as well.”

Waite girls working to succeed

Waite’s girls head coach Manny May enters his 20th year with a team ready to learn.

“We should be experienced in some things,” he said. “We got some young people that didn't run last year for us that came out this year. I have some young kids that are just learning to throw, which they'll learn this year. They're there every day, so they're improving every day we work out. I look forward to seeing what they do on the track.”

May returns Jhanae Hannah, a sophomore who was second in the mile at the City League championship last year. It was the first time she ran the mile, as well, and he said she did very well.

“She had run some fours, some eights leading up to that point just getting ready for that particular race,” he said. “She did alright in the 800 and most of her races, but that day when she ran that mile, it took everything out of her, and she couldn't be back in that 800 to run again.”

Sophomore Izarihanna Owen will compete in the 200. She finished eighth in the city last year.

“It was her first year running last year,” May said. “She really improved each time she went out and ran.”

Additionally, junior Jayla Taylor finished ninth in the city in the 400m and eighth in long jump last year.

Last year’s team also had no seniors, so May is hoping that youth pays off this year and next.

“I’ll know more next year, but they're very excited,” he said. “They're there, they’re working hard, and that's the biggest thing right there. They have a nice-sized team, and they're working hard, and they're putting the work in the weight room and running like they should.”