The boys team made its presence known right away when Nik Kay stepped into the shot put ring and threw 60-feet on his third throw of the afternoon. But Kay was not done yet. On his final attempt, he improved the personal-best he had just set with a throw of 62-11. His final throw not only earned him not only a first place in the event, it catapulted the Wildcat senior to the top of the state leader board.

"I didn't want to have any regrets," said Kay. "I knew it would be my last throw here, so I thought why not go for it."

Kay said an important part of his preparation before the meet was to rest his arm, which started bothering him on Tuesday when he was throwing the discus. Kay's coach Ron McKee decided it would be best if Kay take the rest of the week off.

"He's been prepared to throw in this meet for quite a while," said McKee. "We've been working towards this, knowing something big was likely to happen."

Immediately after Kay finished the shot put, he ran over to McKee to share his excitement. However, with the discus competition starting in less than hour, Kay did not have much time to savor his victory.

"He's got to start thinking about discus in the next five minutes," said McKee.

A short while later, the defending CCS champion in the discus made it clear he was not satisfied with one CCS title. Kay broke his personal-best and the elusive 200-foot mark on his second throw of the discus competition with a 203-11.

As if mirroring his performance in the shot put, Kay bettered his previous mark on his final attempt and threw 204-10. His final effort broke the CCS record set in 1970 by Los Altos' Chris Adams and put him near the top of this year's national list.

"I had a good flight on it, it was high, and I just said, 'I'm going,' " said Kay.

Not only had Kay qualified for next week's state meet in Norwalk in both the discus and the shot, but his two first-place finishes put his team in contention for the team title with 20 points at the time.

The Wildcats added nine more points when Chad Blanchard got leaned out by 2/100 of a second at the finish line of the 800 meters to finish third in 1:55.13, and Chris Little finished tied for fourth after clearing 13-6 in the pole vault. Little hurt his hip on his second attempt at 14-0 and did not take his final attempt due to the injury.

The boys team ended up finishing second with 29 points, six behind CCS champion Serra. And even though their fortune could have been better had Blanchard not been leaned out or Little had not gotten hurt, the Los Gatos boys were extremely excited about their performance, said coach Tom Newman.

As the Serra boys' team stood on the podium to celebrate the team title, Nik Kay smiled as he counted the number of Serra athletes, which was nearly 20.

"Hey coach," he said. "Look at how many people it took to defeat us."

"Quality not quantity," chimed McKee.


Girls

The Los Gatos girls were also on a mission to open some eyes. They did just that by reaching the podium several times. Sally Stanton finished fifth in the 300 hurdles in 46.10 and third in the pole vault after clearing a personal-best 11-4. Michelle Johnson cleared 5-2.75 to finish seventh in the high jump.

But perhaps the most surprising one of all was Christine Jones. The freshman runner showed no signs of youth when she blazed to second in the 800 in 2:12.18.

"She got knocked around a lot," said Los Gatos coach Monica Townsend, "but she didn't panic. She waited until the right moment to kick."

Jones certainly gave it her all, because when responding to questions after her race she first said, "Watch out, I may puke on you."

After seemingly being exhausted after the 800, Jones proceeded to anchor the third-place 4x400 relay team that ran 3:56.50.

After Ali Dodson, Caroline Stege and Stanton ran the first three legs, Jones received the baton in fourth. She quickly made up the distance between her and the anchor from Serra, who was currently running in third. Jones just edged into third on the final straightaway, clocking in at 56.7 for the final 400.

"It shows her that she has leg speed with any girl in the 800 that she is going to meet up with next week," said Townsend. "She's going to be phenomenal."

Based on Friday's performance, it appears she already is.