The Cedar Springs Music Boosters invite you to attend the 51st annual Red Flannel Marching Band Competition to be held on Saturday, October 1 (Red Flannel Day) from 8 a.m.-2 p.m. at Red Hawk Stadium. (It was originally scheduled for 9 a.m. but was moved up an hour due to the number of bands competing.)

The event will kick off at 8 a.m. with the opening by the Cedar Springs 8th grade band. High schools performing between 8:15 a.m. and 9:30 will be Greenville, Fremont, Montague, Ithaca, White Cloud and Fulton; 10 to 10:45 will be Wyoming Park, Sparta, DeWitt, and Plainwell; 11:15 to noon will be Newaygo, Big Rapids, Comstock Park, and Tri County; 1 p.m. to 1:45 will be Mona Shores, Zeeland, Kenowa Hills, Petoskey, and Cedar Springs; and awards will be at 2 p.m.

This contest is held each year in conjunction with the city’s annual Red Flannel Celebration. The Red Flannel Grand Parade begins at 3 p.m. and all visiting marching bands are invited to stay after the competition to march in the parade. Come out and support your Cedar Springs Marching Band!

Cameron Klompstra passing baton to teammate in relay.

Mother Nature continued to play havoc with the Cedar Springs boy’s varsity track team as another meet was postponed and forced them to have a double dual meet against Belding and Comstock Park at Red Hawk Stadium last Thursday, April 30. The team showed resiliency by defeating Comstock Park 118-19 and Belding 124-13 on a very cold, misty, and windy night to improve their record to 5-0 overall and 3-0 in conference. The Red Hawks took all the possible points in 13 of the 17 events against Belding and 10 of 17 against Comstock Park by winning all the events except the shot put against Comstock.
Individual field event winners were Dan Sagorski(discus), Nate Jones(high jump), Derek Ash (shot put), Hank Porter (long jump), and AJ Olszewski (pole vault). The sprint winners were James Putnam (100), Alex Hemry (200), Ron Fisk (400), and Justin Balczak (110H and 300H). Connor Mora led the distance crew by winning the 800m, 1600m, and the 3200m runs.  The 400m relay (Putnam, Hemry, Olszewski, and Ryan Austin), 800m relay(Hemry, Fisk, Balczak, Austin), 1600m relay(Hemry, Fisk, Balczak, Aaron Leal), and the 3200m relay(Mora, Fisk, Alex Bray, and Aaron Brooks)  were all undefeated on the evening.
“We had to go into the evening with the mind-set that we must do what it takes to get better,” said Coach Myers. “As everyone knows, the weather has limited our opportunities to train to our potential and to work on things during competition. We are running out of time to prepare for the most important meets of the year. We have to go full throttle in every event to maximize our potential,” he explained. “Our training this upcoming week must come from the meets that we participate in. Practice is now for fine-tuning and muscle memory training. It is time to test our mental toughness.”

Justin Balczak jumping hurdles. Photo by M. Balczak.

The team enters this week with the biggest meets of the year, but in this season it must prefaced with the caveat “weather permitting.” Tuesday the 3rd we are home against a tough West Catholic team, while Thursday the 5th we travel to Sparta to take on the Spartans and Coopersville.  The week concludes Saturday the 7th as we host the Red Hawk Invitational at Red Hawk Stadium.  Field events begin at 9:00 am, while the running gets underway at 11:00 am.
“This will be a tough meet for us to compete at,” said Coach Myers.W”e have invited three Division I schools.  After a big week against West Catholic and our biggest rival, Sparta, we cannot relax on Saturday.”