CERRITOS -- It's late, and I've had a long day (yes, it started with a workout, thank you very much), so I'll keep this short.

It was a pretty successful day for Kern County at the CIF Track and Field State Championships at Cerritos College in Norwalk on Friday. All of the athletes who were supposed to reach today's finals did so, and there was maybe even a pleasant surprise or two for the locals. Let's look at bullet-point style:

AND YOU EXPECTED SOMEONE ELSE? Shafter's Anna Jelmini and Foothill's Dayshan Ragans have been touted around the state as the odds-on favorites to win the girls and boys shot put and discus double state championship, no small feat. They both looked the part on Friday, with Ragans needing only three throws in the events combined to reach today's finals (the top nine in each event advance to the finals). He ripped off a 60-2 shot put throw on his first attempt and passed on his final two and hit a 203-7 on his first discus throw, fouled on the second and then passed the third. Jelmini advanced with marks of 47-1 and 166-7, easily making her the top seed in each. Kern County as a whole put on quite a show at the discus competition.

A LONE TRACK STAR: I didn't expect it to be a good day for local runners, but there were a few "bubble" candidates to reach the finals on the track, and none of them came particularly close to qualifying. Not so for North's Anthony Mitchell, who pulled off one of the meet's surprises by winning the second heat of the boys 800. That gave him automatic entry into the finals, where he'll be the No. 2 seed. That means prime lane choice for a confident guy that should at the very least finish in the top six and reach the state podium.

TWIN JUMPING JACKS (AND A JILL): So get this. Out of all of the boys triple jumpers in California, only 28 made it to the state meet. Two happened to be from the same school, Ridgeview. That's not terribly uncommon. But what are the odds that Wolf Pack senior Chris Kelly and freshman Johnny Carter would finish the preliminaries with the exact same mark? Both had a top jump of 47-10.5 and tied for fifth in qualifying. If they tie again tomorrow, I ought to put the numbers together and play Mega Millions or something.
On the girls side, Centennial's Alana Alexander scraped her way through the triple jump prelims, coming from the No. 5 seed to finish eighth. Good enough for the first day, but she'll want to get on the podium today. In another surprise, she also placed eighth in the long jump -- pulling off the rare feat of qualifying from the first heat in a field event. She was nowhere to be seen on DyeStat's list of the top 25 marks in the state coming into the meet.

DISTANCE GURU: As good as Foothill's Chris Schwartz has been in the 1,600 and 3,200 this season, he and the Trojans coaching staff decided to pull out of the shorter race at state so Schwartz, the Div. I cross country champion, could focus on the two-miler. Whether that strategy pays off we'll find out Saturday. There are no prelims for the 3,200, so Schwartz rested today while most of his competition -- including favorite German Fernandez of Riverbank -- ran prelims for the 1,600. Some will run again in the finals tomorrow before the 3,200. If Schwartz can place high and Ragans wins his throwing events, Foothill might bring back a team medal to Bakersfield.

There. I said it would be short and it wasn't. Check back tomorrow for more.