SHREWSBURY – A group of four Shrewsbury seniors were at their best on April 29, breaking the school’s 4×800-meter relay record and placing first at the 2023 District E Division 1 Relay Meet.
Chase Orciuch, Declan Daley, Jonathan Shan and Niko Manolakos ran the relay in 8 minutes, 15.04 seconds, beating the school’s previous 2015 record by just under one second.
“It felt amazing – it’s something that you look forward to for months,” Orciuch told the Community Advocate. “It’s something that we really wanted to do. To finally break the school record felt very good.”
“It was pretty crazy,” Shan said. The race marked his first competitive 4×800-meter relay in almost a year. “To be able to hop in and get the record – I thought that was pretty cool.”
For Manolakos, the race was extra special. The group broke the record on his birthday.
“It was a long time coming. I feel like all the hard work really paid off, and that was really exciting,” he said. “It was awesome. It was great. It was very memorable.”
Although the group broke the record, Daley explained that the team was left in suspense immediately after the race.
“When Niko came across the line and the race was over, we had the hand time at around 8:14 [or] 8:15. We know it was close, but we didn’t know if we got it. So, in that five minutes there was a lot of suspense waiting for the official time,” he said.
The team had been working on breaking the record for several months.
“From the beginning of the season – the beginning of the summer, really – we were looking at this record as one we could break… We’ve really been working toward it, so it was really great to finally come together,” Daley said.
On May 27, the group beat its own record at the MIAA Division 1 Outdoor Track & Field Championship. The team shaved nearly five seconds off its previous record with their new 8:10.17 time.
