It took just one race in his senior year to finally bust through that time, as Garber ran a 14.49 to win the 110 high hurdles in the Comet Early Bird Track Meet on Thursday.

Garber not only got past his mental barrier, he set a new school record along the way, breaking the old mark of 14.79 that he and his older brother, Will, shared.

“It’s been a long time coming and it feels good,” Garber said, still catching his breath after the race. “Even on not a very clean race, I looked up right at the scoreboard after I crossed the finish line and I was very excited.”

As Garber said, it wasn’t a clean race for the third-place state finisher in Class 1A a year ago. He was even bleeding from his knee after the race. That still didn’t keep him from setting the school record.

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON - North Tama’s Tyler Morrison, second from left, and BCLUW’s Ben Paper, third from left, compete in the 100-meter dash on Thursday at the Comet Early Bird in Conrad. Morrison finished second in the race and Paper took third.

“I felt very strong, even hitting three of those hurdles,” he said. “I hit one of them and it knocked me off a little bit and I nicked a couple more but I was able to pull through and keep my focus on the next hurdle and finish the race as fast as I could.”

Comet head coach Anthony Jahr, who’s team placed third overall out of 10 teams in his first meet at the helm, said Garber already breaking the record is the best possible thing to happen for his season.

“We know it was kind of one of his goals this season to get that record as soon as possible, and he knows that the school record isn’t the end all, be all, but when it’s your older brother’s record it’s something you want to take care of,” Jahr said of his talented senior hurdler. “I know he is really excited to take down Will’s record, and after coaching Will myself it’s fun too because he was a great kid and those brothers are awesome.”

Garber followed his win in the 110 high hurdles with a victory in the 400 hurdles, finishing in a time of 57.76. He wasn’t the only event winner of the day for BCLUW, however, as fellow senior Caleb Silver locked down the distance races by winning the 1,600 with a time of 4:58.79 and second in the 3,200 with a 10:39.58.

Silver won the 1,600 by almost four seconds, and he said that was still slower than the pace he was looking for.

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON - North Tama thrower Ryan McLean unleashes a heave in the shot put on Thursday during the Comet Early Bird in Conrad. McLean finished second in the shot put with a throw of 42 feet, 8 3/4 inches.

“I wanted to go around a 4:40 but that was tough with the wind,” he said. “I just kept trying to stay on pace and the last 200 just go with all I had left.”

Jahr said having two quality athletes like Garber and Silver at the top of his lineup makes his job almost too easy.

“Jack is just a special kid, and Caleb is equally as special. Those two, what they do on the track isn’t even indicative of how important they are, just because of the stuff they do during practice,” Jahr said. “They lead everything we do, they critique kids, they coach kids, they are great supporters. When other kids are out running those guys are supporting them and it makes the other kids go, ‘man, Jack and Caleb are supporting me and I’m going to get going.’ They are such great teammates too, which is what makes them even more awesome to have as kids.”

Silver said he and Garber enjoy leading by example.

“It sets the bar for those other guys on the team, especially the young kids just seeing us doing that,” he said. “They look up to us and they set their goals too.”

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON

The other guys did take after their senior leaders well, as Neifer Ralston was second in the 400 hurdles behind Garber, the distance medley relay finished in second, Henry Kaisland took third in the 800, Ben Paper finished third in the 100 and Ruben Montoya took third in the 1,600.

North Tama also had some great performances on the day, which led them to sixth place with 44 points.

The best showing on the day for the Redhawks came from the 4×200 relay which took first with a time of 1:39.75. Tyler Morrison ran the anchor leg of that relay and he received the baton with a decent length between him and the runner in first place, but with 50 meters left Morrison had taken the lead and legged out the victory.

Morrison said when he got the handoff he was focused and ready to run, and the encouragement from his teammates Gabe Kopriva and Hale Hulme also helped.

“I know that they are kind of dependent on me and Gabe and Hale kind of yelled when I got the baton so I knew it had to be done. That was kind of my motivation there,” Morrison said.

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON

When he had finally caught the runner from Iowa Falls-Alden, Morrison said he wasn’t sure how much he had left in the tank.

“I maybe didn’t have it much longer but I definitely had a little more,” he said with a grin.

Morrison also finished in second in the 100 with a time of 11.43, while the 4×100 was third with a time of 47.37. There were also some good performances in the field events from North Tama, with Ryan McLean taking second in the shot put with a throw of 42 feet, 8.75 inches, and Hulme placing fourth in the high jump with a vault of 5-8.

Hulme said what he enjoyed most about competing was finally doing his events outside.

“It was different, we haven’t been outdoors for practice or anything, we’ve just been running the halls and it hasn’t been very fun, but once we got out here with the guys it’s a lot of fun,” he said.

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON

Gladbrook-Reinbeck placed eighth in the team scores with eight points. Ridge Van Daele finished in fourth in the 800 with a time of 2:20.32, while the 4×200 relay placed fifth and the 4×800 and distance medley relays both finished in sixth.

GMG was last in 10th place with 1.5 points, with Kooper Gill tying for sixth in the high jump with a height of 5-4 and the distance medley relay also finishing in sixth.

Comet Early Bird

At Conrad

Team Standings — 1. Iowa City West 146, 2. Jesup 115, 3. BCLUW 94.5, 4. Iowa Falls-Alden 83, 5. Wapsie Valley 52, 6. North Tama 44, 7. Des Moines North 39, 8. Gladbrook-Reinbeck 8, 9. Valley Lutheran 6, 10. GMG 1.5.

T-R PHOTO BY THORN COMPTON

EVENT RESULTS (top 3)

100 — 1. Mason Applegate, ICW, 10.73; 2. Tyler Morrison, NT, 11.43; 3. Ben Paper, 11.46.

200 — 1. Trevor Sauerbrei, WV, 22.94; 2. Derek Weitzenkamp, Jesup, 23.25; 3. Caden Mentzer, IFA, 24.67.

400 — 1. Trevor Sauerbrei, WV, 52.14; 2. Derek Weitzenkamp, Jesup, 52.68; 3. Tyuss Bell, ICW, 54.15.

800 — 1. Caden Noeller, ICW, 2:11.05; 2. Chawol Niphong, DMN, 2:17.25; 3. Henry Kaisand, BCLUW, 2:18.44.

1,600 — 1. Caleb Silver, BCLUW, 4:58.79; 2. Nicolo Schianchi, ICW, 5:02.35; 3. Ruben Montoya, BCLUW, 5:03.31.

3,200 — 1. Will Conrad, ICW, 10:27.26; 2. Caleb Silver, BCLUW, 10:39.58; 3. Owen Dawson, VL, 10:41.09.

110 HURDLES — 1. Jack Garber, BCLUW, 14.49; 2. Zach Mead, Jesup, 15.55; 3. Zack Huffman, IFA, 16.06.

400 HURDLES — 1. Jack Garber, BCLUW, 57.76; 2. Neifer Ralston, BCLUW, 58.09; 3. Zach Mead, Jesup, 59.37.

4×100 — 1. Iowa City West 45.13, 2. Wapsie Valley 46.36, 3. North Tama 47.37.

4×100 WEIGHT PERSON — 1. Iowa Falls-Alden 55.18, 2. Gladbrook-Reinbeck 58.23, 3. GMG 59.02.

4×200 — 1. North Tama 1:39.75, 2. Iowa Falls-Alden 1:40.43, 3. Iowa City West 1:43.99.

4×400 — 1. Iowa City West 3:42.71, 2. Jesup 3:46.71, 3. Iowa Falls-Alden 3:47.95.

4×800 — 1. Jesup 9:11.58, 2. Iowa City West 9:15.07, 3. Iowa Falls-Alden 9:25.20.

SPRINT MEDLEY — 1. Iowa City West 1:39.76, 2. Iowa Falls-Alden 1:43.03, 3. Jesup 1:44.12.

DISTANCE MEDLEY — 1. Iowa City West 4:07.47, 2. BCLUW 4:13.54, 3. Wapsie Valley 4:15.96.

SHUTTLE HURDLE — 1. Jesup 1:03.42, 2. BCLUW 1:03.84, 3. North Tama 1:04.49.

HIGH JUMP — 1. Landon Borrett, Jesup, 6-0; 2. Marcus Morgan, ICW, 5-10; 3. Tim Long, IFA, 5-10.

LONG JUMP — 1. Deavin Hilson, DMN, 20-4; 2. Derek Weitzenkamp, Jesup, 20-4; 3. Trevor Sauerbrei, WV, 20-3.

SHOT PUT — 1. Landon Green, ICW, 50-3; 2. Ryan McLean, NT, 42-8.75; 3. Tanner Blaylock, WV, 40-8.25.

DISCUS — 1. Dylan Madden, IFA, 139-8; 2. Cole Finley, Jesup, 131-1.5; 3. Landon Green, ICW, 125-1.

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