After five years of missing out on a top-three finish, the Rio Rico girls track and field team made their way back to the podium with a second-place performance at the Division III state meet in Mesa May 6 and 7. The Lady Hawks finished the competition with 68 points, 23 points behind first-place Fountain Hills. “(Fountain Hills is) very deep, they had girls in just about every event,” RRHS coach Stephen Schadler said. “Man-to-man we matched up very well, but they just had more girls than we did.” Last year the Lady Hawks tied for fourth place and last made the podium with a third-place finish in 2011. The 2016 meet started well for Rio Rico on Friday when junior Alexandra “Allie” Schadler won the 1,600-meter race for the third consecutive year and her sister and RRHS freshman Samantha Schadler snagged her first state title in the 800-meter race. The second day of competition started with a win in the 4x800 relay race by the team of Ximena Nerey, Kiara Laborin and the Schadler sisters. Nerey lost the lead momentarily during the second leg, but recovered in the last 200 meters to regain the lead at the handoff to Samantha Schadler. “Relays are always fun and just to have great teammates around and to be able to get a victory with them is really nice,” Samantha Schadler said. Hours later, Allie Schadler took to the track for the 3,200-meter race as the favorite to win – which she did, with a time of 10:16.72 that was almost a full minute ahead of the runner-up. It was the first year she competed in the 2-mile run, having competed in the 800- and 1,600-meter races last year, and her finish time was the third fastest by an Arizona high school runner in the girls 3,200-meter race. “It was a new experience and a lot of fun,” she said. In the last race of the night for the girls, the 4x400 relay, the team of Emily Rivadeneyra, Victoria Valencia and the Schadler sisters pulled out another first place finish to add to their points. “I’ve grown up with Allie and Emily, so we have a lot of chemistry,” Valencia said. Stephen Schadler said the second-place finish was even more special because it was a true team effort. “That’s why we ended up with the team trophy,” he said. Jenny Martinez nabbed Rio Rico’s first-ever points in throwing events when she finished eighth in discus, and Halle DeWitt was fifth in 100-meter hurdles and seventh in 300-meter hurdles to rack up six points for her team. The boys team wasn’t able to repeat the success of last year, when they finished second in D-III. However, coach Schadler said the athletes still all ran their best times, will learn from the experience and hopefully grow next year. “We just weren’t as deep as we were in the past, so it’s a good year to rebuild and learn,” he said. photo credit: Norma Gonzalez