Highland team breaks own school record

DES MOINES — Apparently nerves make for fast times. Being nervous is a good thing because those nerves led to a Highland High School record.

The Huskies’ 4x200 meter relay team of Kadin Jepson, Brenton Bonebrake, Tyler Thompson and Connor Grinstead finished second in their heat at the state track meet in Drake Stadium Friday and 12th overall.

"Having so many people here makes it so you are more nervous,“ Thompson said.

And that nervousness can either help or hurt. For the Huskies, it helped because more important than the 12th-place finish was the time. The time was 1 minute, 33.46 seconds, which broke the record by nearly half a second. Le Mars Gehlen Catholic won in 1:31.31.

“It feels great to have the school record,” said anchor-leg runner Grinstead.

It was a record the same team established earlier in the year, but the team was more than happy to lower that time.

“It means it will be tougher for somebody to beat that time in the future,” Jepson said.

That earlier race didn’t have the atmosphere or the crowd noise that Friday’s race had.

“The noise is so different from the small meets we run at,” Jepson said. “From those to here, there isn’t anything comparable.”

“It’s the atmosphere here that is just different from anywhere else,” Bonebrake said. “It makes a difference.”

"The competition here is the best we will ever see and that helped us run even faster,“ Thompson said. ”There is a lot more faster kids so we have to keep up with them.“