Friday was a record-setting day on the blue oval for the Ankeny girls’ track team.
Its crosstown rival, Ankeny Centennial, also enjoyed some huge success on a gorgeous April afternoon at the Drake Relays.
Both teams set multiple school records, but it was the Hawkettes who came away with some prestigious white flags. Makenna Madetzke outdueled Centennial’s Rebecca Flick to win the 800, while Ankeny also raced to a victory in the sprint medley relay.
Madetzke set the early pace in the two-lap race and led almost the entire way, posting a winning time of 2:09.16. The senior broke her previous school record by 5 seconds.
“It just feels fantastic,” said Madetzke. “I knew it was coming. I’ve been running 2:14s for the last two years, and I knew there was something more in there.”
Flick also smashed her own school record. The freshman placed second in 2:10.72.
“I feel like we had a good first lap and then we kept pushing,” said Flick. “All the girls helped push each other, and it felt really good.”
Madetzke ran the opening 400 in 1:04.36.
“I kind of knew that a lot of the races have been going kind of slow unless somebody takes it, like the 3K didn’t go out super hot (on Thursday),” Madetzke said. “So I knew that if I wanted to run the time I wanted to run and if I wanted to win, I had to go out hard because I didn’t want to be caught in the mess behind.”
Flick wasn’t surprised by Madetzke’s strategy.
“I expected her to do it, but I was focusing on my own race,” she said.
Madetzke nearly sustained her torrid pace on the second lap, running the final 400 in 1:04.81. Nobody else in the field ran under 1:06.
The race was held under spectacular sunny skies and temperatures in the 60s.
“The weather was amazing,” Madetzke said. “Not super cold and not super hot. I loved it.”
Flick has been a dual-sport athlete this spring. On Thursday, she helped the Centennial girls’ soccer team to a 1-0 victory over the Hawkettes in the Ankeny Derby.
“It’s pretty hard, but both of my coaches communicate with each other and make a plan for me so that it’s not too hard on my body,” Flick said. “They make it easy for me to communicate like if I don’t feel good.”
Ankeny earlier took home the Relays title in the sprint medley relay. The foursome of Quinn Roush, Charlee Cibula, Lena Bruening and Morgan Fisher set a school record of 1:44.11, which ranks No. 2 on the all-time list.
“It feels amazing,” said Fisher, who ran the 400-meter anchor leg in 55.2 seconds. “I’m so happy, we’ve worked so hard. I’m so proud of all of us.”
Waukee Northwest held the lead when anchor runner Logan Vogt got the baton. But the basketball and volleyball star was unable to hold off the hard-charging Fisher.
“I had every faith in Morgan,” said Cibula. “I have no doubts in her at all.”
Fisher finished almost a full second ahead of Vogt. The Wolves were clocked in 1:44.92.
“I knew I had to (catch her),” Fisher said. “She was out in front of me and I just had to give this race my all, and that’s what I did. I literally thought to myself, ‘This needs to be the fastest last 100 I’ve ever done.’ And I just tried to give it every last bit I had.”
Bruening, a junior, ran on the winning sprint medley relay for the second time in three years. As a freshman in 2024, she was part of Waukee’s victorious squad.
Last fall, Bruening found a new home on the south side of Ankeny.
“They really just welcomed me from day one,” she said. “I just felt like I fit in right away. It definitely made this moment that much sweeter when you do it with your best friends.”
Fisher, a sophomore, later set another school record in the 400. She placed second in that event in 55.12, knocking almost a full second off her previous mark.
“I’m proud of myself,” Fisher said. “I ran hard and gave it what I got.”
Kloe Nissen of Cedar Falls came out of Lane 7 to win the race in 55.00.
“I knew it was going to be really close from the start,” Fisher said. “I didn’t know what the outcome was going to be, but I knew it was going to be close.”
Centennial’s Aly Balashaitis also broke her own school record in the 400. She placed 11th in 57.49.
Earlier, Balashaitis anchored the Jaguars to a fourth-place finish in the 4×200 relay. She teamed up with Anna Woods, Ava Barten and Bella Buesch to set a school record with a time of 1:41.99.
“I’m really happy,” Barten said. “I just think that we ran really, really well, and I just really like this team. I’m super proud of what we just accomplished.”
After winning the second of three sections, Barten and her teammates watched from the infield as Waukee Northwest won the final section in 1:38.40, which set an all-time best.
“We were watching that one, and we were watching the clock,” Barten said. “We knew (the time) would be something crazy.”
Ankeny placed 21st in that event. The quartet of Roush, Riley Kayser, Brylee Bach and Cibula was clocked in 1:47.98.
Woods also earned a fourth-place finish in the 100 hurdles. She posted a time of 14.51 seconds after setting a school record of 14.50 in the preliminaries.
“I’m pretty happy with it placement-wise,” said Woods, who had finished seventh in the event in each of the previous two years. “I kind of wish I had gone a little faster, but it’s ok. I feel like it was a pretty good race.”
Valley’s Morgan Karr won the race in 13.99.
“It’s really awesome to run against her,” Woods said. “We see her at our normal meets, and it’s nice that I get to have somebody to push me all the time. We have a really competitive conference, and that’s helpful because it pushes me to be better. So I enjoy racing her.”
Bruening placed 24th in the 100 hurdles in 15.17, while Fisher took 13th in the 100 in 12.21. The Hawkettes also got an eighth-place finish in the discus from Maliya Cobb, who tied the school record with a throw of 131 feet 7 inches.
Centennial closed out the day by shattering the school record in the preliminaries of the 4×400 relay. The team of Balashaitis, Barten, Buesch and Flick posted a time of 3:52.78.
Ankeny also qualified for Saturday’s final in the event. The foursome of Cibula, Gillian Schramm, Isabel Squires and Bruening was clocked in 3:57.80.
“This season has been tricky with all the meets being cancelled and some injuries, so it means a lot that we executed and put in the work and it’s paying off,” Cibula said.
