The lower classifications held sway.
Grossmont was the Southern Section team champion in Class B and most of the area’s future Class A champions were underclassmen, at least a year or two away.
Hoover was enjoying a period of dominance in CPL dual meets, routing San Diego, 64 1/3-39 2/3. Grossmont also defeated the Cavers, 79 5/6-24 1/6.
Birt Slater took over for the retired Bill Patten as coach at San Diego High, destined to excel in this role and as a future head football coach at Kearny.
San Diego lost the potential for a big finish in the championship meets when Bill Walters, outstanding in the short races as a sophomore in 1954, transferred to Sweetwater and was the County leader with a :09.9 100-yard dash.
3/3/55
Two future stars, sophomore sprinters Bobby Staten and Roscoe Cook of San Diego, ran 1-2 in the 100-yard dash, but Hoover ran, jumped, and tossed its way to first place in the annual City Prep Relays in Balboa Stadium.
The Cardinals were first in the combined, three-man broad jump, shot put, and mile relay, showing strength on the track and in the field events.
Hoover scored 65 points to San Diego’s 45, and Kearny’s 44. La Jolla followed with 17. Lincoln and Point Loma had 10 each and Mission Bay 8.
Staten beat Cook in a :10.2 100 and teammate Leonard Kary topped La Jolla’s Junior Jackson in a :15.2 120-yard high hurdles race.
Hoover jumpers Denny Hill, Choc Sportsman, Jr., and Rod McMillan combined to reach a record 62-3 ¼ in the broad jump. Hill had the best jump, 21-3 ¼.
3/5/55
SOUTH BAY RELAYS
The first annual at Chula Vista High was similar to the established City Prep League Relays. Totals were combined for three-man events.
Bill Walters, who showed promise at San Diego High as a sophomore, was outstanding for Sweetwater, his new school.
Walters won the individual 100-yard dash in :10 and anchored Sweetwater to wins in the 440 and 880 relays.
Grossmont won the team title with 68 points, followed by Chula Vista, 38, Sweetwater, 36, Helix, 17, and Mar Vista, 5.
Grossmont’s Rene Rogers won the individual mile in 4:48.8 and teammate Jerry Kocourek the 180-yard low hurdles in :20.8.
3/9/55
Hoover’s Bob Monzingo beat Mission Bay’s Jim Cerveny in a 4:47.6 mile in a race of future stars.
Hoover had most of the stars, winning 92 1/3-11 2/3.
La Jolla was losing a huge link to talent in Mission Beach and Pacific Beach as Mission Bay would fill out a senior class in the next school year.
But not yet. The Vikings socked Point Loma, 71 ½-32 ½, behind a couple diverse performers.
Mike McCartney won the 440 in :55, the 180 low hurdles in :20.8, and was third in the broad jump. Junior Jackson won the 120 high hurdles in :15.5 and the shot put at 46 feet, 1 inch.
McCartney and Jackson ran the last two legs of the relay, which Vikings won in 1:35.3.
3/10/55
Bernard Harrod won the 220 in :22.3, 440 in :51, and anchored the winning relay (1:33.8) but San Diego claimed the dual meet, 54 ½-49 ½.
3/12/55
Bill Walters of Sweetwater split races with Compton Centennial’s Ken Dennis, winning the 220 in :21.4 after Dennis took the 100 in :09.9 in the 34th Southern Counties’ Invitational at Huntington Beach High.
Rene Rogers of Grossmont won one of the mile races in 4:31.
San Diego’s Leonard Kary was second in high and low hurdles races that were won in :15 and :19.7.
Hoover’s John Haley was second in an unofficial :21.6 to the 220-winning time of :21.5 by Joe Graham of Pomona.
North Phoenix pole vaulter Lee Bullard cleared 13-5 1/8, breaking the record of 13-3 by San Diego’s Bill Miller in 1929.
Sophomore Jim Brewer, Bullard’s teammate, cleared 13-0 and two years later would become the first prep to top 15 feet.
Walters joined San Diego’s Jimmy Willson (1929), Morris (Mushy) Pollock (1933), and Darnes Johnson (1950) in a group that had traversed the furlong in :21.4.
San Diego’s Glenn Willis (1942) and Grossmont’s Bert Kohnhurst (1952) ran :21.5.
Another San Diego runner, Harold Miller, clocked a wind-aided :21.2 in 1947.
3/17/55
Hoover stood only 5-16-1 since 1932, when the dual meet series started, after its 64 1/3-39 2/3 win over San Diego, but the victory was the Cardinals’ second in the last three seasons.
Leonard Kary of San Diego ran :14.8, the fastest 120-yard high hurdles of the season. Kary also won the 180-yard lows in :20.2.
Hoover’s John Haley doubled in the sprints (:10.2, :22.7) and anchored the fastest 880-yard relay of the season, 1:31.7.
3/18/55
Lincoln outscored Point Loma, 57 ½-45 ½, in its CPL opener and celebrated its first-ever dual meet win after a 0-5 debut in 1954
Charlie Cox doubled in :10.3 and :23.8 in the 100 and 220 for the Hornets.
–John DeMarco flirted with the all-time CPL record, 12-foot, 5 1/16 inches by Helix Jim Terry in 1952.
The Kearny pole vaulter went over 12-3 1/8 in a 62 ½-42 ½ loss to La Jolla.
3/26/55
La Jolla won 5 of 12 events but was buried under an avalanche of Hoover depth, 71-33, in a meeting between unbeaten squads.
Bob Monzingo set a Hoover record of 4:34.2 in the mile and sophomore Dick Verdon set a shot put record of 54-4 ½, beating his older teammates, Tony Procopio and John Adams.
–Grossmont swarmed Mar Vista, winning the varsity dual, 97-7, Class B, 89-8, and Class C, 72-5.
3/30/55
Leonard Kary ran :14.8 in the 120-yard high hurdles and :20.6 in the 180 lows in San Diego’s 78-26 win over St. Augustine.
Alfred Woerner defeated sophomore teammate Roscoe Cook in a :10.1 100, won the 220 (:23.5), and hooked up with Cook as part of a 1:32.6 triumph in the 880 relay.
4/1/55
Grossmont took on Compton Centennial, a second-year school which already had already had won CIF Southern Section championships in track (1954) and football (1954) and would win this season in track.
The Apaches of coach Bill Gill won eight events and the dual meet at Grossmont, 59 ½-45 ½.
The Foothillers’ Rene Rogers logged a 4:30.9 mile, tops in the area this year.
–Darrel Sager’s 1:59.8 in the 880 and George McElvain’s :51.8 in the 440 set school records and McElvain was part of a foursome that included Eddie Vega, Waco Thrower, and Bill Walters that set a standard of 1:31.5 in the relay
–Lincoln was improving. The second-year school was an 88 1/3-15 2/3 victim of powerful Hoover, a better result than 1954’s 99-4 Hoover victory.
John Adams, Hoover’s 205-pound football star, equaled a City Prep League best when he clocked :10.2 in the 100. Adams returned to win the 220 in :22.6.
–Gil Bartell’s 2:03.4 880 and Jim Cerveny’s 4:45 mile set Mission Bay records, although La Jolla won the CPL dual, 74-28.
4/15/55
Grossmont and Sweetwater headed for a Metropolitan League collision, both undefeated after impressive victories.
The Red Devils defeated Chula Vista, 73-31, as Bill Walters won the 100 in :09.9, the 220 in :22.2, and anchored a 1:32.2 victory in the 880 relay.
Darrel Sager broke the school record in the 880 for the sixth time in the last two seasons, recording a 1:59.4 clocking.
–Hoover clobbered Point Loma, 94 2/3-9 1/3, as John Haley became the first CPL competitor this season to run the 100 in 10 seconds.
4/22/55
Grossmont stunned Sweetwater, 75 ½-28 ½, in the big Metropolitan League dual, with Jerry Koucerek leading the way.
Koucerek won the 120 high hurdles in :15.4, 180 lows in :20.5, broad jump at 21 feet, 2 inches, and was a member of the school-record 880 relay squad that finished in 1:32.
Rene Rogers set another Grossmont record, winning the mile in 4:26.0 and bettering the all-time County best of 4:26.8 by San Diego’s Al Heredia in the 1939 state meet.
4/26/55
San Dieguito lost the relay as Vista set a school record of 1:36.4, but the Mustangs had enough points before the race and clinched the Avocado League dual-meet championship, 52 2/3-51 2/3.
Mustang Phil Medina won the high hurdles (:16), broad jump (19-7) and 440 (:53.1).
4/27/55
Denny Hill took the County lead with a 22-foot broad jump and Hoover completed an undefeated season with a 79-25 win over Kearny.
4/28/55
Bob Coon set a Chula Vista record of 2:01.3 in the 880-yard run, but the Spartans took an 80-24 licking from undefeated Grossmont in the season’s final dual.
Darrel Sager set another record for Sweetwater, but not in the 880. So named “The Stork”, Sager strolled the mile in 4:34.3 and the Red Devils defeated Mar Vista, 86 2/3-13 1/3.
4/29/55
Luther Hayes, a sophomore mid-semester transfer from Lincoln, knocked Hoover’s Denny Hill from his two-day lead in the broad jump, reaching 22 feet, 1 inch, in the final dual meet of the season.
Hayes also won the 440 in :54.4 and ran a leg on the winning relay team (1:33.6) as San Diego defeated Point Loma, 72-31.
5/3/55
LEAGUE TRIALS
Sweetwater’s Bill Walters ran :21.5 in the 220 in the Metropolitan League preliminaries at Chula Vista.
Grossmont sent 41 entries in Varsity, Classes B, and C to the finals. Chula Vista actually had more varsity qualifiers, 16 to the Foothillers’ 14.
Jerry Koucerek tied a Grossmont record of :15.2 in the 120-yard high hurdles.
THOSE KEARNY MESA BREEZES
San Diego’s Alfred Woerner ran the 100 in :10 and 220 in :21.6, marks that would have set CPL Class B records but were aided by the usual wind at Kearny.
Hoover led all varsity qualifiers with 17, followed by La Jolla, 11.
San Diego’s Roscoe Cook (:10.1) and Bobby Staten (:22) had faster 100 and 220 times in Class B than that of varsity heat winners.
5/6/55
CPL FINALS, @BALBOA STADIUM
Hoover romped to the team championship with 78 points to 36 for La Jolla, but the action was in Class B.
A team of Roscoe Cook, Dennis Russell, Alfred Woerner, and Bobby Staten covered the 660 relay in 1:07, setting a CPL record and tying the Southern Section meet record.
Hoover’s Bob Monzingo ran the B 1320 in 3:15.6, which tied the CIF meet record but was short of the City Prep League mark of 3:15.1 by Grossmont’s Rene Rogers in 1954.
CIF records could be set only in divisional or championship meets.
The Hoover quartet of Willie Kaufman, Bob Agnew, John Adams, and John Haley covered the 880 relay in 1:30.1, better than the 1:30.6 by San Diego in 1954.
La Jolla’s Cookie Taylor, with an all-time best of 6-4 in the high jump and the 1954 Southern Section Class B champ, did not qualify for the Divisional meet the next week.
T.C. Johnson of Kearny won at 5-9 ¾ and Taylor had more misses than the two jumpers with whom he tied for second. Three qualified in each event.
AVOCADO FINALS, @ESCONDIDO
San Dieguito, with 45 ¾ points, took the team title in the first-year league.
Charlie Love of Coronado was a triple winner, :15.5 in the 120-yard high hurdles, :52.3 in the 440, and 20-5 ½ in the broad jump.
METROPOLITAN FINALS, @CHULA VISTA
Grossmont swept all three classifications and qualified 46 entries in next week’s CIF Divisional meet.
Rene Rogers’ 4:24.3 mile smashed the record of 4:35.7, set by the Foothillers’ Jim Giyer in 1953 and bettered Rogers’ 4:26 County record.
Another Grossmont mid-distance runner, John Kershaw, won the 880 in 1:57.9.
Chula Vista’s Bob Coon trailed Rogers with an unofficial time of 4:33.
5/14/55
Hoover (15) and Grossmont (12) led in varsity qualifying on a cold, blustery Divisional day at San Diego State.
La Jolla’s Mike McCartney won a 440 heat in :51.5. John Kershaw of Grossmont and Bob Gallaher of Hoover won 880 trials in 2:01.3 and 2:01.4, respectively.
Leonard Kary of San Diego (: 15, :20.3) and Junior Jackson of La Jolla (:15.3, :20.4) were winners in heats of the 120-yard high hurdles and 180-yard lows.
Ray Hiscock of St. Augustine led shot putters at 53-8 ½, and Hoover ran 1:30.7 to lead the 880 relay.
5/17/55
Rene Rogers became the Southern California leader with a 4:21.7 mile in the Divisional semifinals at Huntington Beach.
Rogers’ time threatened the CIF meet record of 4:21.2 by Torrance’s Louie Zamperini in 1934.
Grossmont placed 13 athletes in Classes A, B. and C for the championship meet later in the week.
Bill Hammond of Grossmont set a Class B pole vault record at 12 feet, 11 inches, and teammate Jim Walton set a school record of :13.3 in the 120-yard low hurdles.
San Diego’s Roscoe Cook won his 100-yard dash heat in :10.2 and teammate Bobby Staten rook a 220 race in :22.2. Both ran on the wining, 1:07.8, 660-yard relay squad.
Hoover’s Bob Gallaher qualified at 1:58.8 in the 800 and Bob Monzingo won his 1320 heat in 3:14.6.
Leonard Kary of San Diego set the pace in the Class A hurdles, winning in :14.6 and :19.4. Hoover’s relay team won in 1:30.2.
5/21/55
Gorgeous, perfect weather at Ontario Chaffey for the CIF championships.
Junior Jackson was fifth in the 120-yard high hurdles in :14.7, one tenth of a second off the school record of :14.6 by Jerry Wood in 1950.
Compton Centennial’s future San Diego Chargers great Paul Lowe won a tight duel with San Diego’s Leonard Kary, tying the meet record of :18.9 in the 180 low hurdles, with Kary nosing out Lowe’s teammate Ken Thompson for second in :19.
Rene Rogers of Grossmont led until tying up in the final 180 yards in the mile. Newport Beach Newport Harbor’s Tod White came on to win in 4:23.2 and Rogers barely hung on for second in 4:25.9.
Sophomore Luther Hayes, who was running 440s for Lincoln early in the season and before transferring to San Diego, was fifth in the broad jump at 21-9, off his County-leading 22-1.
St. Augustine’s Ray Hiscock was fifth in the shot put at 55-1, a school record.
Riverside Poly won the 880 relay in 1:28.2, with Hoover third in 1:29.0.
FOOTHILLERS EXCELL
Grossmont won the Class B championship with 18 points, ahead of Compton Centennial, 17, and San Diego, 13.
Jim Wade won the shot put at 52-10 ½, with teammate Armstrong third at 50-11 ¼. Bill Hammond was first in the pole vault at 12-9 and teammate Bill Logan tied for second at 12-6.
Bobby Staten of San Diego won the 220 in :21.8, followed by the Cavers’ Alfred Woerner. Roscoe Cook was third in the 100 and fifth in the broad jump at 21-3 ¼.
Hoover’s Bob Monzingo was second and Mission Bay’s Jim Cerveny third in the 1320, behind the record 3:11.9 of
Newport Beach Newport Harbor’s Don Beatty.
San Dieguito tied for fifth with 9 points in Class C as Funaki tied the 1938 meet record of :13.4 in the 120-yard low hurdles and was third in the broad jump at 20-9 ¼.
5/28/55
STATE FINALS @LOS ANGELES COLISEUM
Area representation could not have been thinner in the 35th state meet at the Los Angeles Coliseum, scoring only from San Diego hurdler Leonard Kary.
Kary won his heat in the 180 lows in :19.3 in the morning trials and was third in the afternoon final in :19.4, behind Compton Centennial’s Paul Lowe (:19.2) and Los Angeles Jefferson’s Willie White (:19.3).
Grossmont’s Rene Rogers was a non-scoring sixth in the mile and Hoover was eliminated in its heat in the 880-yard relay.
