2005 Outdoor Track Meet of Champions

It was the biggest and most important individual competition of the New Jersey Track and Field season at the Meet of Champions, a week ago Wednesday, but the pole vault jumping area at Frank Jost Field in South Plainfield had a familiar and local look as Westfield senior Mike Woods and his friend and rival Anthony Abitante of Governor Livingston were the only two jumpers attempting to clear 15 feet 6 inches.

Abitante of Gov. Livingston of Berkeley Heights cleared the height on his final try to win the pole vault and defeat Woods, who jumped 15-0. The duo have a rivalry based on mutual respect and sportsmanship which was accentuated earlier this season at the Union County Championships, when Woods cleared 15 feet for the first time to upset Abitante What made the achievement more unique was that Woods had borrowed Abitante’s pole because he thought the pole was better than his was at clearing the height.

Adding further to the local flavor was Westfield senior Michael Gorski, who made it a clean sweep for Union County with a 14-6 effort for third. The 14 points from Woods and Gorski combined with a third place finish in the 3200 from junior Jeffrey Perrella to give the Blue Devils 20 points. If official team standing had been kept, the Blue Devils would have which placed fourth in the entire state behind Old Bridge, Notre Dame and Phillipsburg, which each got almost all of their points from one performer.

Veteran Westfield Track Coach Jack Martin, who has coached his share of stars over the years, was pleased but not necessarily surprised.

“I thought we had the type of team this year that could perform well at this level,” said Martin

“Most of the boys improved tremendously this year. All the coaches did a
great job in each of the areas.”

Perrella continued to excel in the biggest meets of the year, with a strong third place finish on an unbearably warm and humid evening to post a personal best of 9:20.12 Perrella was one of only two runners to follow the blazing pace set by overall winner Robert Papazian of Gill-St.Bernards the eventual winner in 8:59.78. Perrella finished less than two seconds behind second place finisher Ben Massam of Chatham, but did gain revenge on Geoff McGrane of Randolph who had defeated Perrella at the Group IV championships the previous Saturday. Perrella also defeated county rival Joe McKenney of Cranford in their first outdoor 3200 race of the season.

Martin, who coached Matt Elmuccio, the only three-time distance champion in the history of the Meet of Champions and isn’t easily impressed, had high praise for Perrella.

“Jeff ranks up there with the best at 3200 and could be up there in 1600 as
well. His cross country performances are definitely among the best as well,” said Martin.

Until this year, Perrella had played soccer in the fall and in his first year as a cross country runner was first team all state.
Scotch Plains-Fanwood’s four entries in the Meet of champions failed to score but sophomore Kyle Rowbotham continued to impress by almost placing in the 400-meter intermediate hurdles despite being in the second fastest heat. Rowbotham was fourth in his group in a personal best of 56.04 and has finished his first year in the intermediate hurdles with a flourish.

“We are very pleased with how he ran- 11th in the state as a sophomore is phenomenal, especially when it's your first season doing an event,” said Scotch Plains Fanwood coach Jeff Koegel.

Rowbotham had to quickly move over to the triple jump competition where he finished a record setting first season with 40-07.75 for 22nd place.

“We kind of expected that he wouldn't triple jump as well. The problem is that they only mark your first jump and will not mark any subsequent jumps unless they are better than the 12th best jump in the first round. His second and third jumps were better, but they were short of that mark and did not get measured as a result,” added Koegel.

In the girls competition senior Michelle Regg finished 30th in the triple jump with a leap of 31-03.50 and Katie Zaleski finished a record setting year in the pole vault with a clearance of 9-6, tied for 19th place.