ARCADIA, Calif. – While most track meets during the spring season are all the same, there are a few that stand out more than the others. Whether it be due to the level of competition or the location of the meet, there are simply some that rise above the others, and one of those meets happened this past weekend in California at the 2023 Arcadia Invitational.
The Arcadia Invitational featured some of the best track and field student-athletes around Canada, California, Colorado, Utah, Washington, Nevada, and even some states on the East Coast like Georgia and New Jersey. Joining this hefty competition was Lander’s own Gage Gose, one of the best hurdlers in recent Wyoming high school history.
Gose was accompanied by a few other Wyoming athletes, but none had as good of a weekend as the Lander Valley Tiger in one of the biggest meets of his senior year.
Not only did Gose take first in both his 110-meter hurdles and 300-meter hurdle races, but he also broke his own personal records in both the events. He beat his previous record in the 110 (14.44 seconds) by over one-tenth of a second when he crossed the finish line at 14.31 seconds. Then, in the 300-meter hurdles, Gose improved his previous record (37.45 seconds) by nearly two-tenths of a second with his 37.29-second finish.
In that 110-meter hurdle event, Gose’s time was the sixth-best of the weekend behind a student-athlete from Upland, Calif., with a blitzing time of 13.85 seconds, which ranked 14th across the entire country. But, Gose’s 14.31-second time did push him into the top 75 in the 110-meter event nationwide, sitting the Lander Valley star at 72 alongside Oklahoma’s Dean McCune.
The other event that Gose ran — the 300-meter hurdles, ended with the Tiger track star topping everyone else at Arcadia and inched him closer and closer to the fastest time in the country as he propelled himself into the top 10 with his 37.29-second time. Not only that, Gose’s time demolished the 3A state mark of 37.96 set back in 2007 by former Powell High School and University of Oregon standout Justin Cross.
Other Wyoming track and field athletes that made a splash in California were Big Piney’s Colby Jenks, finishing ninth overall in the 800-meter run (1:52.18), and Cheyenne Central’s Sydney Morrell who finished the same run with a time of 2:14.71, garnering a top-25 finish.
Needless to say, Gose has continually improved from the first time he stepped on the track, and this upcoming senior season could very well see him break even more records, both at Lander Valley High School and state or nationwide.
By: Shawn O’Brate