Lehman continues assault on record book

“He doesn’t jump without setting records.”
Those were the words of Custer High School head track coach Karen Karim  after senior Cade Lehman set another record at last Friday’s Pierre American Legion Relays.
The latest record Lehman broke that Karim was referring to was his own school record in the long jump, as Lehman won the event with a record-breaking leap of 23-1. Lehman won the event by nearly two feet at a meet that included many of the Class AA schools in the state. His jump was the longest in the state this season, regardless of class.
“It’s phenomenal. He’s a pretty humble kid,” Karim said. “He just matter of factly goes about doing this thing.”
Lehman also won the event he is now the state record-holder in, jumping 48-0 1/2 in the triple jump to win the event by five feet.
On the girls side the Stiefel sisters continued their domination of pole vault, finishing in the top three places in the event. This time it was big sister Ciana who came away with the gold, clearing 12-3, while Kelsey was second at 11-9 and Tenlee finished in third at 10-9.
Jojo Larsen had another big day in the sprints, winning the 200 in a time of 25.29, while placing second  in the 100 in a time of 12.16. Larsen lost to Kali Ringstmeyer of Pierre in the 100, but defeated her in the 200. The two will be teammates next year on the University of South Dakota track team.
The boys picked up a pair of fifth-place finishes at the meet, as Roland Sedlacek threw the javelin 152-2, while Carter Tennyson cleared 5-11 in the high jump.
Rounding out the boys places at the meet was Sean Shipp, who was just short of a personal record (PR) in the 3200 with a time of 9:46.71, which was good for seventh place. Shipp did not lose to anybody in the race who is not from a Class AA school.
On the girls side, Jayda Bennett placed sixth in the 100 hurdles in a time of 15.80, but fell early in the 300 hurdles when she clipped a hurdle and hit the track hard.
Despite that, Bennett got up and limped to the finish of the race.
“She’s so competitive and attacks the hurdles so hard. She went down hard,” Karim said. “She’s one tough kid to finish that race.”
It appears the Wildcats may have a budding star in the high jump as well, as Tenlee Stiefel, only an eighth-grader, continued to improve her PR in the high jump, clearing 4-11, good for seventh place.
“It was a big meet. We didn’t have a lot of medals, but we got some things accomplished we needed to,” Karim said.
Last Wednesday the Wildcats were on their home track for the only time this season when they hosted the Custer Invitational, which was moved up a day due to impending weather.
The full squad didn’t compete due to the Pierre meet happening two days later, but those who did compete performed well, including Bennett, who won both the 100 and 200 in PR times of 13.11 and 27.37, respectively.
Also grabbing a pair of gold medals was Karyn Ellerton, who won the shot put with a best throw of 36-5 1/4 and the discus in 135-2, the latter of which was a PR.
“Mr. Bailey is a very good throws coach and he develops his kids,” Karim said of throws coach Russ Bailey. “The girls had some big throws.”
The sisters Stiefel again went 1-2-3 in the pole vault, with Kelsey taking the gold this time by clearing 12-6, followed by Ciana and Tenlee at 11-9. The pole vault competition was moved indoors at the Armory due to weather.
Tenlee Stiefel also grabbed second in the high jump with a top height of 4-9, while Kelsey was second in the 200 at 28.21 and third in the 400 with a PR time of 1:03.25. Ciana also ran the 200, placing fourth at 29.47.
Keira Alfson won a gold medal for the Wildcats in the 800, finishing in a time of 2:37.79.
Another second-place finish came from Siena Schultz in the 100 at 13.79, while Addie Sander was third in the same event at 13.99.
Other third place finishes included Riley Messer in both the 100 and 300 hurdles at times of 18.58 and 53.52, respectively, the latter of which was a PR.
Rylan Lowe rounded out the third-place finishes for the girls, throwing the discus a PR distance of 110-1. She also PR’d in the javelin on the way to a sixth place finish at 91-3.
Fifth place finishes came from Ariyah Bennett in the discus with a PR throw of 99-8, as well as Fiona Weber with a PR in the high jump at 4-5.
Tenlee Stiefel wrapped up her day with a sixth-place finish in the 200 in a time of 29.47, while the 400 relay team of Rachel Adams, Sunshine Surratt, Olivia Welch and Weber joined forces to post a sixth-place time of 56.82.
Sander grabbed seventh place in the 200 at a time of 29.51, while Ariyah Bennett was eighth in the shot put at 30-10 and Keira Nelson was eighth in the 400 in a PR time of 1:08.77.
The boys had four meet champions, including Danny Immormino in the 100 at a time of 11.86, Sedlacek in the javelin with a top throw of 147-7, Ezra Wollman in the pole vault at 10-9, and Shipp in the 800 with a time of 2:08.88. That time was one-tenth of a second faster than his second-place finishing teammate Austin Drew.
Carter Tennyson cleared 6-1 to place second in the high jump, as did Wyatt DeFreece in the pole vault at 10-9.
Ayden Dooley was third in the pole vault with a top height of 10-3, and a pair of relay teams placed third.
The 1600 team of Zane Gunnell, Austin Drew, Jackson Wiles and Tyler Cooper did so in a time of 3:54.29, while the 3200 team of Jayse Noem, Jared Cooper, Connor Lundy and Dylan Frank did so in a time of 9:31.33.
Kian Rusch brought home the lone fourth-place finish with a PR time of 53.86 in the 400, and Lincoln Golder was fifth in the shot put with a best toss of 42-6 1/2, which was good for a PR as well.
Zane Gunnell ran a PR time of 2:10.98 to place fifth in the 800, and the final fifth-place finish came from the 1600 relay team of Peyton Krueger, Joseph Prince, Saylor Rice and Ian Schiffer in a time of 4:09.19.
Custer got sixth-place finishes from Torin Knight in the javelin with a best throw of 120-1 and Tyler Cooper with a PR time of 2:3.74 in the 800, and seventh-place finishes from Knight in the 200 in a PR time of 24.99, Krueger in the 800 at 2:15.52 and Tennyson in the javelin with a PR throw of 118-8.
“We see times dropping on our top kids and some marks improving,” Karim said. “It worked out really nice for us. We saw some things we wanted to see.”
The Wildcats go from a big meet in Pierre to an even larger meet this weekend when they head to the Howard Wood Dakota Relays/Sioux Falls O’Gorman meet this weekend.
The meet is home to the “special” races that are fielded each year, and this year Larsen has been invited to run in the special 200, which will pit her against the other top 200 runners from around the region.
This invitation-only nine-person field will battle at 6:55 p.m. Central Time Friday, May 2. Those who wish to watch the race, or any event, can do so via live stream at youtube.com/@howardwoodfieldsfsd334/streams.
“It’s a big honor to be in that special 200,” Karim said. “(Howard Wood) is a big stage to perform on. You get some great competition. It’s different than the state meet. It’s a different level of competition. It’s a great experience for our kids and you hope it translates to success at the end of the season.”