Catasauqua High School’s track and field team captured multiple medals at the Colonial League Track and Field Championships on May 9 and 10 at Whitehall High School.

Catasauqua sprinter Hailey Jenkins clinched a gold medal and was crowned Colonial League champion in the 100 meter dash with a time of 12.44.

“It’s a really big deal,” said the Catty freshman and newcomer to the sport. “I just wanted to get a fast blocks start and keep that same pace all throughout the race.”

Jenkins, who originally had no intention of joining the track and field team this year, then earned a silver medal in triple jump with a distance of 35-09.00.

“I’m actually really proud of myself. I didn’t really want to do track, at first. My mom forced me to,” Jenkins smiled.

Lauren DeLong won the bronze medal in shot put with a distance of 32-09.00.

Jacob Dove also won bronze in the 400 meter dash with a time of 51.70.

“Pacing is the hardest part of that race, and it’s also hard to maintain the mentality. They might not even up,” Dove said. “Sometimes you might think you’re messing up your pace, so it makes the mentality go down, and things like that. So if you can get that perfect flow going, which is hard to do, it makes the race 20 times easier. I got close to it. I tried.”

The Rough Riders also medaled in four relay events.

Abigail Antipas, Jenkins, Madelyn Gonzalez, and Heaven Jenkins combined for a third-place finish in the 4x1 relay with a time of 50.78.

“We were second-to-last, at first, and then I got the baton and ran as fast as I could and caught up to everybody,” said Gonzalez, who ran the third leg. “We almost got second. We were really close, but my handoff from Hailey wasn’t that good, so it slowed up our time a little bit, or we would’ve caught them.

“We improved so much from last year, running 56, and now we’re running 50. It’s really good, and I know [at districts], we have a chance of getting first. The team we have to beat is Northwestern, and I’m pretty sure Southern Lehigh is moving up (in classification), and that was our competition today.”

Catty’s boys 4x4 relay team of Wyatt Younes, Cedric Bright, Peter LaPointe, and Dove also placed third with a time of 3:35.27.

“I’ve been waiting a year for this, so it feels good,” said LaPointe, who ran the second leg. “Handoff felt pretty good. It could’ve been a lot better, but it could’ve been a lot worse. Overall, my race was pretty decent. In the last hundred meters, I slowed down a bit, but I still gave it my all.”

Younes led off for the Rough Riders.

“I felt the best for this race. Everyone PRs at Whitehall, and we have a great group of guys and coaches who push me every day at practice,” Younes said. “They all prepared me for this day, and I stepped up when the time came.”

Bright ran the third lap, taking the handoff from LaPointe.

“The race was close, so I thought the handoff was going to be a bit slow between all the runners, but Peter handed off to me good,” Bright said. “I was able to get some space, and I ended up behind, but then I quickly took the lead and put us in third place, and I’m happy with how everything went down. I believe our time could’ve been a lot better, but I’m really proud of us all.”

Dove anchored the relay and maintained the third position for Catty.

“Really, what I was thinking was I need to finish out this race for my team,” Dove said, “so when I was coming around the end here, it’s really just all I had.”

Fourth place medals were awarded to Dove, Younes, Hamaad Jenkins, and Bright in the boys 4x1 relay with a time of 44.56, and Jenkins, Antipas, Alivia Bear, and Jenkins in the girls 4x4 relay with a time of 4:20.19.

The Rough Riders track and field team, coached by Kyle Rusnock, will have competed in the District XI Class 2A Track and Field Championships on May 16 and 17 at Whitehall High School where qualifiers will advance to the state meet later this month.