BROOMFIELD >> Track and field can sometimes be a race of inches, with each improvement coming by small marks.

That, at least, was how Jefferson Academy junior Emilee Harding decided to approach her spring season. With each passing meet, she hoped to set a personal record.

She obliterated her previous PR at the Broomfield Shootout at Elizabeth Kennedy Stadium on Saturday when, in the 100-meter hurdles, she ran 15.62 seconds for an improvement of nearly three-tenths of a second. Only Horizon’s Bella Palillian managed to run another sub-16 time (15.99), and nobody else clocked in below a 17.19.

“I finished my race and I had the biggest smile on my face,” Harding said. “It was the best race I’ve ever run. It’s just really cool to have the feeling of just constantly getting better.”

Later in the day, she won the 300 hurdles with a 50.36.

Already a few meets into the season, Harding has reigned in every 100 hurdles race she’s run. She entered the meet ranked seventh in the state, among all classifications, as a Class 3A kid. Almost everyone with faster times hailed from 5A.

In a day filled with performances to smile about, Harding stood out. She’s hoping she’ll continue to turn heads as the season wears on, as she inches closer and closer to reaching her ultimate goal.

“Our offseason training starts in November, so immediately after I finished my volleyball season, I got straight into track season,” she said. “I’ve been training really hard because it’s my goal to win state this year. I’ve been really pushing to try to see if I can keep PR-ing in every meet to get to state.”

Starting out on top

Much like his female counterpart, Jefferson Academy’s Chrisly Kelly-Cannon has been crushing his final season of high school track.

It started months before the spring slate began, during indoor season, when he briefly held the top time in the nation in the 60-meter dash at 6.87 seconds. Naturally, he’s been an early state contender to keep an eye on this spring, two years after taking home one of JA’s first-ever track titles with a 23-foot, 1.5-inch long jump.

Just a few weeks into 2023, he sat at No. 1 in the state with a 10.71 in the 100-meter dash.

“Right off the bat, I started running a really great PR in the 60,” Kelly-Cannon said. “Long jump was pretty good. I’m trying to get my bearings back in the long jump. But the 60 was really great, because I ran over a tenth of a second faster than I did last year.”

On Saturday, Kelly-Cannon kept the fire going with gold in the triple jump (45-7) and in the 200-meter dash (22.16 seconds). He hadn’t competed in either event this season prior to Saturday.

“I thought I was going to be around 43 (feet) but I just turned it up today for some reason. I think my jumps coach is really helping me a lot,” he said. “I was feeling it the last 50 meters (of the 200) but I just kept pushing.”

Braving the elements

Wind is never ideal when one is launching oneself over 13 feet into the air, but Boulder senior Rafer Severson took it in stride.

On Saturday, with the bone-chilling gusts picking up midway through the meet, Severson added to his already-impressive season with a 13-foot, 6-inch performance in the pole vault, good enough to win him the event.

He started pole vaulting just six months earlier, but no casual spectator would have guessed that.

“I have not been pole vaulting for very long,” Severson said. “It was something my college that I’m committed to (Hastings College) wanted me to try out. I ended up winning USATF indoor for Colorado and pole vaulted 14 feet. I went to that meet just looking to try to get a PR and it turned into a really big PR for me.”

Prior to that personal record-setting launch, the future decathlete hadn’t cleared anything past 12 feet.

Giving her best effort

As was the theme for many competitors, Legacy sophomore Gabby Shepston had to alter her race strategy on the fly.

Prior to her 400-meter dash, she had hoped to beat her PR, but fate — and the weather — was not on her side. Instead, she settled for first place with a 59.67 time. Generally, her strategy revolves around getting out the first 60 meters, maintaining that velocity, then speeding up even more on the second curve.

“I was definitely going out there to win. I wasn’t really expecting a good time. Going into the meet, I was, and then it got windy,” Shepston said. “When I started to pick up, the wind was pushing me back and it was a lot harder to sprint with it. It made my muscles colder while I was running, which definitely did not help.”

Making one last push

All season long, Centaurus has enjoyed a strong performance from its boys team. Junior Jake Schwarting and senior Max Heins provided a microcosm of that in the waning hour of the Broomfield Shootout on Saturday night.

In the 3,200-meter run, with darkness beginning to envelop the track, the two kept pace with one another for the first seven laps before Schwarting made his move. In the final 50 meters, he surpassed his teammate to take fourth place and a 9:50.58 time. Heins clocked in at 9:51.69.

“I’ve made a pretty big jump this year,” Schwarting said. “Max used to be beating me by a lot, and now we’ve been going back and forth. I’m really happy about that race. I know it’s not quite indicative of my finish because I got injured two weeks ago. I pulled a hamstring in an 800. I’ve been cross-training for a week, week and a half and I just was getting back into it this week.”

Before the meet began, the Warriors’ boys 3,200 relay team briefly held the top time in the state at 8:04.90, but Mountain Vista blew that time out of the water at Elizabeth Kennedy Stadium, crossing the finish line in 7:55.16.