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The UHSAA track meet got off to an exhilarating start as multiple state records were broken on the first day of competition.
The biggest surprise of the day came via Milford's Emily Barnes, who broke two 1A state records in the 400-meter dash and 300-meter hurdle preliminary heats.
Barnes started by finishing the third 400-meter heat with a time of 57.85 seconds, besting the 1997 record of 58.36 second set by St. Joseph's Amanda Alvarez.
Barnes took to the line for her favored event in the second heat of the 300-meter hurdles. She finished first and set another state record, with a time of 44.46 seconds. The previous record had been set by Piute's Cally Allen with a time of 45.43 seconds.
"You work so hard for it," Barnes said. "You've got one time to get it so you have to go after it. I don't know where that came from. [Setting the record] in the 300 hurdles has been my goal since last year, and then at region I cut a second off of my time to set the region record. I was just trying to go for a [personal record] and I ended up getting it."
Barnes said next is to finish the job on Saturday and win the finals in both events. "I'm going to try and go break my records again, definitely."
There was also a surprise finish in the 4A 1,600 meters as Provo's Kate Hunter overcame an Achilles injury from earlier in the year to win the final with a time of 5:01.79.
"I've been injured for all of indoor and some of outdoor," Hunter said. "I didn't really know what to expect. I had done good at BYU [Invitational] two weeks ago, so I was just hoping that I could repeat that."
There was also a sense of redemption for Hunter who narrowly missed out on the 1,600-meter title in last year's state meet, finishing behind Maple Mountain's Britney Lund by less than a second.
"I'm really happy that I got to do it again, last year was kind of sad getting barely second so I was just trying to kick it in the last one hundred and I'm glad I can try to do it again next year."
Camilla Moses of Syracuse and Brielle Carr of Herriman both broke Paige Erickson's (Davis) 10-foot eight-and-a-half-inch 5A record pole vault from last year, but Moses came out on top with a final vault of 11-feet. ___
Team standings
5A •
Herriman • 33 points
Syracuse • 27 points
Bingham • 22 points
4A •
Ogden • 26 points
Bonneville/Olympus • 16 points
Judge Memorial • 13 points
3A •
Cedar • 38 points
Desert Hills • 36 points
Park City • 20 points
2A •
North Summit • 44 points
Delta • 38 points
North Sevier • 24 points
1A •
Panguitch • 52 points
Tintic • 25 points
Wayne • 18 points