There will be no delay this season to the start of the Penobscot Valley Conference/Eastern Maine Indoor Track League season.
Two meets are scheduled for Saturday at the University of Maine’s New Balance Field House which opened a bit behind schedule last January but is set to begin hosting its second year of high school action.
Five-time defending girls league champion Bangor High School and 2014 boys winner Hampden Academy are among seven teams in Meet A, which begins at 10:40 a.m. Hermon, Old Town, Foxcroft Academy, Mattanawcook Academy of Lincoln and Bucksport are the other competitors.
The action continues at 3:10 p.m. with Meet B, which features Brewer, Orono, Ellsworth, Central of Corinth and Sumner of East Sullivan.
Mount Desert Island will not be in attendance as the Trojans are competing at the Bowdoin Relays in Brunswick.
The Bangor girls, who finished third in the Class A state meet, must replace a handful of top performers, including jumper/sprinter Tiffany Gray. The Rams will be led by senior Abby Reynolds, who holds the league record in the pole vault.
Among a handful of championship scorers back for Bangor are junior sprinter Felicity Palmer, senior jumper Bayley Smith, junior high jumper Vaso Turlla, sophomore sprinter Rihan Smallwood and senior pole vaulter Olivia Wallace.
Some of the league’s returning event champions this season are Hampden Academy junior sprinter Krystal Grant (55 meters) and Ellsworth junior Elizabeth Perry (shot put).
Senior Fern Morrison of Foxcroft Academy is back in hopes of establishing herself as the front-runner in the 400 and 800 meters. John Bapst’s Katie Cotton (hurdles) and MA’s Tia Tardy (high jump) are other potential front-runners.
Among the boys, senior distance runner Spencer Canham also is poised to move up in the ranks after providing points for a Hampden Academy team that was laden with seniors a year ago.
Seniors Tyler Moore, Jonathan Seymour and Robert Frye look to boost their impact.
Old Town senior Nick Boutin likely will be the man the sprinters will be chasing after he won PVC/EMITL titles in the 55 and 200 meters last winter. Senior Aaron Miller of Mount Desert Island High in Bar Harbor is the reigning high jump champion.
The order of the running events has changed slightly as the hurdles will be held after the 4×800 relays and prior to the dashes.
Admission is $5 for adults and $3 for children in grades K-12. Fans are reminded to enter through the new entrance closest to the “M” on the field house and proceed down the hallway.