TACOMA — As Ava Enriquez sprinted towards her attempt at 12 feet in the 3A Girls Pole Vault at Mount Tahoma High School on Saturday, the only thought running through her mind was to just clear the bar.
The Shorewood senior lifted herself over, causing the bar to shake with light contact on the way down, but it stayed in place. Enriquez secured her spot in the next round, and one by one, her fellow competitors kept knocking the bar down. With all the remaining athletes failing to clear 12-00, Enriquez stood alone. Competing against no one but herself, she cleared 12-06 on her second attempt, then went for 13-01.15 — or an even four meters — to try and set a personal record.
As an overcast sky turned into light rain, she missed all three attempts, just barely grazing the bar to knock it over the third time, but it didn’t matter: Enriquez was a state champion. After placing second last season, the University of Hawaii commit accomplished what she set out to do.
“Today I went into it with the goal of winning,” Enriquez said. “I feel like you go to state trying to win. … After I passed 12 feet and moving on from that bar, I was able to find myself, find my rhythm and just like start to enjoy the competition, and that’s when, like, I started to see my best vaults. So yeah, even with the rain and everything, I feel like I’m happy with the way I finished.”
Sure, pretty much any athlete would start enjoying the competition more once they clinched the title as well, but Enriquez was able to keep her competitive fire burning even after her opponents bowed out. For one, she’s used to beating out opponents by even larger margins than the 12 inches that separated her from the trio that tied for second. But it also allowed her to work at her own pace.
“It’s almost like the opposite problem that a lot of people have: She enjoys having the show all to herself,” said Steven Pust, Enriquez’s club track coach said. “She can get her in own rhythm whereas, if you looked earlier in the competition, she was waiting 20-30 minutes between each jump, which is really hard to keep your central nervous system firing over and over for such a ballistic event.”
With the show to herself, she delivered a dramatic performance. Her successful 12-06 attempt barely stayed on, and she rose from the mat with an expression that pretty much said, ‘Whew, that was close.’ Despite not clearing the four-meter mark, each attempt looked better than the last.
When it finally ended, she sat up with a clap and smiled, then stood up to wave to the crowd watching her. For a girl who joined the team as a freshman only at her friend’s insistence, it’s an ending that would have been hard to believe back then.
Enriquez competed in gymnastics for 12 years, but was ready for a change early in high school. So she joined Shorewood’s track & field team as “the sprinter’s best friend.”
“Once you’re in level 9 and 10 and, like, getting higher up in gymnastics, it’s a lot harder on your body and mentally,” Enriquez said. “I think I was ready for something new. I was ready to love a sport again.”
Enriquez’s gymnastics background no doubt helped her pick up the pole vaulting learning curve quickly. After figuring out the event was something she was good at, she went from vaulting 5-06 in her first-ever meet to clearing 11-00 by the end of her freshman season, where she placed fifth at states.
Enriquez decided to pursue the sport year-round, joining the NW Pole Vault club, and has spent the past few years building up to her championship finish on Saturday. She will compete at Nike Nationals in a couple of weeks before toning down to prepare for the college transition.
But before she moves on to bigger and better things, she took a second to appreciate closing out her final high school meet on a high note.
“This being my last meet is just crazy,” Enriquez said. “I just can’t even believe it’s happening. I feel like I’m so proud of how I went out, but this team is, like, better than I ever expected. Track has been like the world to me, so I love it. I have so much pride representing Shorewood.”
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In Girls 3A, Mercer Island (70) won over Mt. Spokane (56) and Gig Harbor (48). In Boys 3A, Liberty (Issaquah) (57) won over Lincoln (Tacoma) and Mt. Spokane (48 each). Below are the rest of the results involving The Herald’s Area Teams:
Girls Team Scores—8. Mountlake Terrace (31), t-9. Shorewood (24), 18. Snohomish (14), t-36. Edmonds-Woodway (3).
Boys Team Scores—10. Shorewood (22), 13. Snohomish (19), t-19. Shorecrest (11), 22. Edmonds-Woodway (9), t-23. Stanwood (8), t-29. Meadowdale (7).
Top 8 Finishers on Saturday:
Girls 300 hurdles—2. Brynlee Dubiel (Mountlake Terrace) 43.30; 6. Lucy Eichelberger (SW) 45.69; 7. Madeleine Brouillard (SW) 46.05.
Girls 800—5. Hanna Bruno (SW) 2:14.90; 6. Aliah Karl (E-W) 2:16.23
Girls 400 relay—4. Snohomish (Sienna Capelli, Avalos, Eva Lambert, Stich) 48.44
Girls 800 relay—7. Snohomish (Kennedy Perasso, Hailey Hinton, Danica Avalos, Baella Stich)
Girls 1600 relay—4. Shorewood (Brouillard, Eichelberger, Hanna Bruno, Mila Fotinatos) 3:54.55.
Girls pole vault—1. Ava Enriquez (Shorewood) 12-06.
Girls shot put—6. Tyler Gildersleeve-Stiles (Snohomish) 37-10.25.
Boys 100—4. Emmett Maxwell (Sno.) 11.00
Boys 300 hurdles—5. Barric Danielson (Stan.) 39.72
Boys 400—6. Brian Mills (Meadowdale) 50.51
Boys 800—5. Kai Yoder (Sno.) 1:54.69; 6. Ryan Khoury (Stanwood) 1:55.16; 8. John Patterson (Meadowdale) 1:55.37
Boys 3200—5. Otto Erhart (Shorewood) 9:12.82
Boys 1600 relay—6. Meadowdale (Courtney Rawls, Matthew Patterson, John Patterson, Mills) 3:26.07.
Boys javelin throw— 1. Jackson Sketchley (SC) 194-08; 3. Jaxon Pontak (Edmonds-Woodway) 176-09.
Boys shot put ambulatory— 4. Boon Dumrong (Shorecrest) 21-04.25.
Mixed 100 unified— 3. Nathan Lyford (Stan.) 12.43; 7. Sened Tekle (SW) 12.92.
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