"Huntley's Marcus Popenfoose sets a new county record of 196-9 in the discus finals during the McHenry County Track & Field Meet at Crystal Lake Central High School in Crystal Lake, Thursday, April 23, 2009. Popenfoose, who shattered the previous record of 164-6 set by Jacobs' Brad Foote last year, also won the shot put."
After yesterday's four assignment marathon I thought that today would be a piece of cake but boy was I wrong.
For whatever reason I have never covered Track and Field before today. I am, however, rather familiar with it since my dad was a coaching stud wayyyyyyyy (sorry dad, you're no spring chicken) back in the day. With that in mind I was really looking forward to it.
The weather forecast was good and thankfully the late evening showers held off until after the event was over. The light was going in and out of the clouds but when it decided to show it's face I made a few nice frames.
The race finals are Friday (today) so I focused on the field events. There were a few key characters that I need to cover including Huntley's dominant force, Marcus Popenfoose. This kid could flat out through but did it with such grace that you wouldn't think that he could launch it. He toasted the county discus record by more than 45 feet and also took home the shot put title.
The most difficult thing for me was trying to keep track of all the kids and their events. They don't have numbers on their jerseys to identify them so I used the voice memo function on my camera to record their jump/throw distances and later matched them up with the results sheet. Thankfully by now I can at least recognize school colors which is a huge help. I had another late night as the events didn't end until nearly 9pm and I had to edit, caption and throw up a gallery.
For my first time covering track and field I'll take the results. I know what to expect the next time I'm assigned to a meet. I do know that I will approach it a little bit differently next time. I realized that shooting tight at 400 and 560 are great if you "hit it" but results are slim. The wide angle is my best friend for the event which I really like because most sports are shot with a telephoto lens because you're so much farther away. I enjoy being different and this is a great sport to do it.
I'm back on the grind early so I'm hitting the sack.
-JCE
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