CREEKSIDE – With sophomore sprinter Alex Collier blasting the 100 meter field and not the 400 meter field, the Orange Park High track team speed squad is slowly making moves to be in position to challenge the fastest runners in the state in a few weeks.

“Right now, we know Alex (Collier) is solid in the 400 with back-to-back sub-50 second wins in the past couple of meets,” said Orange Park sprint coach Kevin Elmore, who was corraling his sprint team for the upcoming 4 x 100 meter dash at Creekside’s Friday Night Lights. “We are moving guys around to get a feel for who will be explosive at the end of the season.”

Elmore’s corral included senior Alex Meadows, who has inched closer to the 50 second mark and took a fighting second in the 400 to Fleming Island High’s Felipe Fernandez, 50.56-51.57 with Raider teammate Sean Dixon seventh at 53.56.

In the 100, Collier bested the fast field with an 11.01 winning time to edge at Flagler Palm Coast’s Tryquarius Jenkins who was runneruup at 11.25. Orange Park junior Keanan Restall ran 11.57 in the closely matched field for 12th.

“I wanted that 10 point something tonight, “said Collier. “It’ll come. Running the 100 will make me faster in the 400 which a 46-47 is the goal.”

Orange Park junior distance runner John Bear, who got his seed time under 4:30 recently at Bishop Snyder, found himself in the mix of a fast elite field in the Creekside 1600 with Columbia’s Yassin Raffay blitzing the field in the first 800 while Bear contended with Creekside’s Matthe Ortiz and Columbia’s Burch Greene to position the threesome for a chase to Raffay early lead.

On the third lap, near the 1000 meter mark, Raffay seemed to falter and allowed the chase pack to pass him on the curve in what seemed like a doomed early attempt to steal the race.

On the final lap, with Ortiz and Bear shoulder to shoulder and Greene lurking, the trio made a strong move to break from Raffay, but the Columbia senior was not going away after working the field.

“I worked too hard to not win,” said Raffay, after he snuck in around the trio with a quick move in the first lane to win in 4:29.28 with Green second, Ortiz third and Bear fourth in 4:30:59.

Bear, who has a 1:59 split for the 800, finished fourth at the Creekside 800 in 2:02:34.

In the 4 x 100 relay, with senior Marquise Brown leading off with Dixon, Antuan Cooper and Zykiem Sermons on the track, Orange Park ran a second plae 43.32 to Bartram Trail’s 42.65.

“We’ve moved guys in and out of that relay to try and get a good crew,” said Elmore. “If we get to regions or states, it will be the best four on the track.”

In the final event, the 4 x 400 relay, with some trouble on handoffs, Orange Park finished sixth behind a win by Fleming Island’s quartet of Jared Ashe, Jacob Ashe, Fernandez and Austin St. Laurent who clocked a 3:31.35.

“We need to be under 3:25 at least to get to the state meet which will be running guys under 3:20 in the final,” said Elmore. “We’ve got some work to do.”

In team points, Creekside won the womens title over Ponte Vedra with Bartram Trail taking the mens title at 136.5 points over Creekside’s 70.5 with Fleming Island third at 59 and Orange Park fifth at 56.

Other top finishers were Fleming Island’s Aubrey Burke, fourth in the 400 in 1:03:57 with teammate Adriana Neilen sixth in 1:04:24; Middleburg’s discus duo of Dakota Peppard and Paige Novatsky going second and fourth, respectively in their specialty; Fleming Island’s Keaundra Noid, fourth in the shot put; Middleburg’s Marcus Floyd with a 22.48 win in the 200; Fleming Island’s Glenn Rodgers with a win in the 110 meter high hurdles; Fleming Island’s Evan Fuller with a win in the 3200 in 9:41.26 with teammate Kameron Wallizada seventh in 9:59.53; Fleming Island’s Darnell Deas with a win over Marcus Floyd in the triple jump; Restall furth in the long jump and Middleburg’s Alex Barfield with a third in the discus.