CIF-Central Section Finals
Wednesday, May 16, 2007 @ Madera HS

C.learly I.nconclusive F.inish

Photo by Rich Gonzalez
At right, three girls battle for third and final berth to state in the girls' 100-meter dash.
After a Jury of Appeals deliberation, a few phone calls, and plenty of observation,
it was declared that a "run-off" will be required to determine the final qualifier.
The photo above is of the photo-timing image used by the FinishLynx camera,
which can shoot at close to 1200 frames per second. The actual on-screen image
was further "blown up" in size and truly revealed the order as amazingly inconclusive.

By Rich Gonzalez
Editor, DyeStatCal
      (MADERA) -- Five-plus hours of action. One-thousandth of a second of indecision.
      The biggest "news" from the Central Section Finals emanated long after the final race had been run, shortly after a few phone calls to state meet management had been made, and days before this will all finally be settled.
      But for now, three girls await their fate: Buchanan's Cashmir Whittle must wait to see if she qualifiers in a second individual event to the CIF-State Championships; Bullard's Ashley Collier must see if she will only go as part of a relay, or if individually as well; and Clovis East's Arianna Johnson must decide whether she needs to make alternate plans in her hometown on the weekend of the state meet.
     "What a crazy way to end the night," muttered one veteran Central Section head coach as the crowd of coaches finally began dissipating near the finish line tent at Wednesday's CIF Central Section Finals (also dubbed the Valley Championships) at Madera High.
      A crazy way indeed, but still a splendid day of action which saw Clovis East's boys (paced by Kendrick Young's 20 individual points) romp to the team title and Stockdale (powered by a pair of sprint relay wins) secure a victory in the final track event to win the girls team competition.
      Performance-wise, it was Fresno Roosevelt's Kyle Alston who unleashed the loudest thunder, rocketing to big wind-legal wins in both the 100- and 200-meter dashes in Valley-leading times of 10.60 and 21.28, respectively.
      The other super-hot boys double (all told, four boys won two events apiece) came in the throws as Bakersfield Foothill's Dashan Ragans uncorked superb marks of 190-01 and 58-10.00 to win the discus and shot put crowns, respectively. Central's Kenny Phillips (high jump/long jump) and Clovis East's Kendrick Young (both hurdle races) each also won a pair of CIF Sectional individual titles.
      The most compelling boys competitions of the day came in the 400m, the 3200m and the high jump. In the one-lap dash, Reedley's Remington Blair rallied to catch Bakersfield South's Jason Ward (47.45 to 47.68, the #4 and #5 times in the state this year); in the eight-lap challenge, Parlier's Erick Garcia twice passed Bakersfield Foothill's Chris Schwartz in the last 500 meters, including entering the final straightaway for a 9:09.69-to-9:13.34 win; 5-foot, 7.5 inch tall Kenny Phillips of Central out-dueled Buchanan sophomore Travis Smith in a battle between 6-10 high jumpers, with Phillips prevailing on this evening with a 6-08 effort.
      The leading headliner for the girls was Lauderdale, who posted huge marks to win the 100 (11.75 windy) and 200 (24.37 legal). Also in sprint action, Stockdale continued its dominance of it signature events, with wins in the 4x100 (48.42) and 4x400-meter relays (3:54.26). We believe it was Stockdale's eighth consecutive Valley title in the short relay and seventh consecutive in the long relay.
      Other double winners on the girls' side were Bakersfield Centennial long sprinter Ashley Thomas and Visalia Mt. Whitney jumper Moira Robinson. Thomas powered to big wins in the 400 (56.67) and the 800 (2:17.15) while Robinson bounded to titles in the high jump (5-08.00) and triple jump (39-06.75, wind legal), adding a second in the long jump (17-05.25, legal) for good measure.
      State leaders Rosario Sanchez of Selma and Jordan Hasay of Mission Prep also excelled in their specialty events, with Sanchez winning the shot put on a best mark of 47-10.50 and Hasay leading from wire to wire to claim her second section title over 3200 with a 10:20.86 blowout win.
      Most outcomes were very clear. The girls' 100-meter dash clearly was not.
      With athletes aided by a 2.4 meters-per-second tailwind in the fast heat (there were two heats in each 9-lane race -- the top 4 placers at three Area meets, the top 3 placers from another Area meet, plus the next 3 fastest times from all four Area meets for a total of 18 entries), Lauderdale was the clear winner over Stockdale's Romesha Anderson (11.89), but we were not immediately aware from our vantage point in the press box (overlooking the middle of the straightaway) how close it was for third place between Whittle, Collier and Johnson.
      It was not until the track meet was over (and while two late-starting field events were still ongoing) that we overheard a few officials and coaches discussing a photo finish decision from that race with the photo-timing operator. Earlier in the meet, the Jury of Appeals had decided that a head finish judge's decision to declare one girl as the official third placer in the 100 based on a visual observation of the "live" race would stand, over-riding the apparent "dead heat" that had been judged on the finish-line computer image by the photo-timer. The photo-timing device was on the infield and positioned to view across the finish line, but no back-up photo-timing camera was in place on the outside of the track at the finish, which would view across the line from the opposite direction, thus giving far better evidence in an ultra-close race.
      With only the top three placers in each event automatically advancing to the state meet, the ruling was vital to identifying the state qualifiers. When we heard the Head Finish Judge was declaring the finish order based on human eye observation of the live race and the Jury of Appeals agreed that such a ruling superceded the photo-timing image, it quickly caught our attention. The explanation being given was that a photo-timing device can only officially determine time, not place. We thought the rule interpretation being made was the incorrect one. Turns out it certainly was.
      We immediately called Hal Harkness (who handles the state meet entries for CIF) at his home in Orange County for clarification, and Harkness looked up the rule and quoted over the phone that indeed the photo-timing image prevails over the Head Finish Judge's visual observation of the live race. Harkness declared that a determination of a third-place finisher needed to be made to identify the final state meet qualifer from the race.
      As the photo-timing operator was then about to call up the finish image on his track-side computer and DyeStatCal was about to get its first look at the finish image, more controversy developed.
      The Clovis East coach then arrived at the table and stated he wished to also see the image because he felt his athlete (Johnson) was right in the mix and might have actually been third. This intrigued us, as we did not observe during the race how close it actually was for third place, and the Jury of Appeals only met to discuss the order between Whittle and Collier for third place.
      As the image came up on the screen, the Clovis East coach sure had a legitimate beef. The timing operator opined that the position of Johnson's upper body on the image -- with the FinishLynx timing device operating at nearly 1200 frames per second -- made it highly unlikely that she also was in the dead heat. His contention was predicated on a bio-mechanical basis, where Johnson's right shoulder was drifting behind the other two sprinters in the image, thus concluding her left shoulder (which was not visible, as she was between the other two sprinters on the image) was in torque and still not visibly ahead of the torsos of the other two sprinters, thus leaving her own torso (which is the body part used to determine placing in a track event) somewhere in between her two shoulders and thus leaving her officially in fifth place.
      However, the image was inconclusive in that it could not be proven that her torso also wasn't arriving at the finish line at the exact same instant.
      Harkness was called again by phone. At first he thought we were kidding. Upon hearing an explanation of a third sprinter in the mix, Harkness stated the three athletes must have a run-off 30 minutes after the final track event. It was then explained to him that the track meet had already ended and some of the sprinters in question had apparently already left the premises.
      Harkness then stated a runoff would be necessary between the three girls and needed to take place before the Central Section entries are due to the state office next Wednesday (May 23rd), with the winner of the run-off being declared as the Section's third and final event entry into the state meet preliminaries.
      One coach then suggested the run-off be held at the newly installed Mondo-surfaced track at Buchanan High School. Another half-jokingly said perhaps all three girls would meet the state meet at-large standard in the run-off on such a fast track, thus meaning all three would earn spots to CIF.
      Sorry guys. Run-offs are only used to determine place -- not to determine an official time.
      We don't need another controversy!

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