-Messenger photo by Britt Kudla Fort Dodge Boys Track and Field Returning Letter winner are left to right, Front Row: Sam Daniel, D'Arien Calahan, Tyler Schreier, Eli Elsbecker, Christian Davidson. Back: Jake Erickson, James Danel, Thomas Daniel, Sawyer Springer, Jerry Chada.

John McBride isn’t wasting any time wondering about what could have been, in fact the Fort Dodge boys track coach is looking for his team to beat the time crunch.

Last season was wiped out and the Dodgers were primed and ready to contend for a couple of state championships, but because of the COVID-19 pandemic that wasn’t possible.

“We haven’t really talked about it (last year),” said McBride, who enters his 14th season as FDSH head coach. “We have to go hard every day, because of our condensed timeline. We haven’t talked about last year and the possibility of winning a couple of titles.

“We have some seniors this year that are ready to compete hard and chase some state titles.”

Now after the state has decided to move the start to the season back two weeks, McBride knows his group must prepare hard every day.

“One of the things that happened, and we knew it was coming was the season getting pushed back two weeks,” McBride said. “We had to speed up our process after we started the first day in March.”

The chase for the Drake Relays will start earlier as well and the format on the Blue Oval will be different too. The Drake Relays will take place on April 22 and the qualifying cutoff time will be Thursday, April 15 at midnight.

Once the relays begin in Des Moines, the high school portion will be held on one day — April 22.

Seniors Tyler Schreier and Sam Daniel return with high expectations. Schreier was a three-time medalist as a sophomore, finishing eighth in the 100-meter dash, fifth as part of the 4×200 and eighth as part of the 4×100 along with Daniel.

“Sam and Tyler have the experience,” McBride said. “Tyler placed three times at state as a sophomore and Sam had a great football season.

“They said they want to go out and do what they thought they could have done last year.”

McBride believes his group’s strong point is the sprints and the short distance events. The Daniel triplets Sam, Thomas and James will compete in the sprint events along with Pocahontas Area senior transfer Christian Davidson, who was a state qualifier for the Indians as a sophomore. Junior Jake Erickson will run some sprints as well.

“The one thing with that group is that most of them can run 100s, 200s and 400s,” McBride said. “It will be to our advantage to be able move them guys around and come up with a good combination.”

Running middle distance events will be senior Jerry Chada and junior Eli Elsbecer. Elsbecker will run some 800s and also some 400s as well as Chada.

McBride sees incoming freshmen Ty Adams and Gavin Doebel as being the mile and two mile guys.

Junior Tyler Kasperbauer and sophomore Connor Carver will run the low and high hurdles.

Junior Amaris Harris and senior D’Arien Calahan will also compete in some hurdle events.

Schreier, will return to the long jump pit for the first time since his freshman season.

Junior Tay’Den Hooper and sophomore Javion Jondle will be high jumpers and senior Sawyer Springer will throw the shot put and the discus.

“We have 12 meets this year (The Dodger Relays will be on April 12) and we will be running two to three tiems a week,” McBride said. “We want to compete. With the season being pushed back two weeks, we have been able to avoid for the most part some of the cold weather.”

The Dodgers will open the season Saturday (today) at Des Moines East. The meet will begin at 10 a.m.

McBride will be assisted by Matt Miller and Andy Kavanaugh.

SCHEDULE

March 27 — at DM East, 10 a.m.; 30 — at Nevada Invitational, 4:30 p.m.

April 1 — at Marshalltown Invitational, 4:30 p.m.; 8 — at DM Lincoln Invitational, 4 p.m.; 10 — at DM Roosevelt Invitational, 10 a.m.; 12 — Dodger Relays, 4:30 p.m.; 15 — at Waukee Invitational, 4 p.m.; 19 — at Norwalk Invitational, 4:30 p.m.; 22 — at Drake Relays; 26 — at Mason City Invitational, 4:30 p.m.; 29 — at Waukee Invitational, 4 p.m.

May 4 — at Ankeny (CIML Iowa Invite), 4:30 p.m.; 13 — State qualifying meet.

ROSTER

Seniors — D’Arien Calahan, Jerry Chada, James Daniel, Sam Daniel, Thomas Daniel, Christian Davidson, Carter Forbes, Tyler Schreier, Sawyer Springer, Baptiste-Pierre Vanlin.

Juniors — Jon Astor, Hugo Durandet, Eli Elsbecker, Jake Erickson, Keyton Fraser, Amaris Harris, Tay’Den Hooper, Tyler Kasperbauer, Degan Klindt, Dalton McCuddin, Brett Thompson, Jake Wagner.

Sophomores — Connor Carver, Carmelo Hughes, Ayden Johanson, Javion Jondle, Jacob Marxen.

Freshmen — Ty Adams, Gavin Doebel, Kenyon Garrett, Damarious Knight-Clark, Justin Krog, Jeremiah Laughlin, Carter Nekvinda, Malaki Pettigrew, Ezequiel Pineda, Evan Pratt, Karch Smith, Kaivyone Williams.