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Parascandola, Fedrick shine in New Hampshire

Friday, May, 28 By Jeff Hamrick

MERRIMACK NH — Becca Parascandola of Londonderry thought she had a chance for the trifecta, but Salem's Jerickson Fedrick wasn't as confident about his. Both, however, highlighted yeterday's New Hampshire Class L state track meet.

Parascandola set a new classification record in the 100-meter hurdles and also captured the high jump and long jump titles to help Londonderry to a third-place finish. Fedrick, meanwhile, pulled off the sprint double winning both the 100- and 200-meter dashes and anchored Salem's winning 4 x 100 meter relay.

"I had a rough start to the season," said Parascandola, who blazed to a 14.61 in the hurdles to eclipse the 17-year-old record of 14.64 set by Nashua's Sheri Gagnon in 1983. "But as the season went on it got better and better. I came in (yesterday) with good seeds and I knew that I could perform with them."

The Londonderry senior's other winning marks were jumps of 5-4 in the high and 17-4 1/2 in the long. In her first event , Parascandola was one of three girls that went 5-4 in the high jump, but she had the fewest misses while Salem sophomore Victoria Rozumek placed third. Parascandola finished her day at the long jump where she had the eventual winner in the preliminaries.

"The way the meet was run was good for me," said Parascandola. "I went from one event to the next to the next and it was a flowing kind of meet and I was just ready to compete. I knew (the trifecta) wasn't impossible. It's definitely a confidence booster for the rest of the season."

Fedrick, who was a starting running back on Salem's state-winning football team in the fall, put  a nice bookend on his sophomore season with wins blazed to a 11.03 in the 100 and a 22.47 in the 200. He also rallied from second place to first with his anchor leg in the relay. In the 100, Fedrick's biggest rival according to times was Pinkerton's Eric Guinto, who was unable to compete with a pulled hamstring suffered two weeks earlier on the same track at Merrimack High School.

"I really didn't know (about the 100) because I didn't have anyone to push me," said Fedrick, who like Guinto ran a 10.7 earlier this year. "I didn't know if I would run my fastest, but I'm grateful I did. I didn't really expect to win the 200. I just hoped for the best and competed."

The biggest surprise on the girls' side might have been Salem's Amy Desrosiers, who won the discus with a heave of 128-11 — almost 7 feet longer than her previous best.

"I've had a lot of really good practices," said Desrosiers, who's winner came on her final attempt and soared 13 feet farther than any of her previous five throws. "I was hoping to have a good meet. I was thinking I had something like that in me. But I bombed it."

The only other area girl to win was Melissa Higgins of Salem, who captured the 300-meter hurdles in 44.76. Manchester Central won the team race with 82 points, while Bishop Guertin was second with 76 and Londonderry was third with 70. Pinkerton (51) was fifth and Salem (50) was sixth and Timberlane (16) was tied for 10th.

On the boys side, Max Jacques of Salem won the high jump (44-1) and Evan Towle of Timberlane won the pole vault (12-0). Bishop Guertin (95) edged out Nashua North 94 for the team title with Salem (58) fourth, Timberlane (33.83) sixth, Pinkerton (16.33) 11th and Londonderry (1) tied for 16th.