First Eagle Games a success

Lancaster athletes compete in athletic, strength and agility, and relay events

LANCASTER — Lancaster High School’s inaugural Eagle Games was a success last Thursday on the Lancaster football field and track.

The event was part of the Athletic Leadership Program and was hosted by program coordinator Ron Wilson, Vice Principal of Athletics Ricardo de la Pena and Principal Dr. Kristen Tepper.

More than 50 athletes teamed up to participate in 12 different athletic, strength and agility, and relay competition events.

The top three teams won medals along with the top male and female finishers and the top volunteer of the day. The volunteers were members from ROTC, ASB and Lancaster faculty/staff.

The teams were randomly selected and given a colored wristband to distinguish between them. Most teams had three males and three females.

The first-place team wore red wristbands and included the top female competitor, Van Chambers, who plays softball for the Eagles.

The top male competitor was baseball player Brayden Fischenich.

The duo did the best in the 12 events, which included: a 4x200-meter relay, pull-ups, jump ropes, broad jump, push-ups, football accuracy throw, baseball accuracy throw, medicine ball throw, weight pulley, W drill, soccer challenge and putt challenge.

The athletes also heard from 2017 Antelope Valley High grad Tyrese Dedmon, who was a three-year letterman in football and track and is finishing his Master’s Degree at the University of Idaho, where he also played football. He recently had a football tryout at the Seattle Seahawks rookie minicamp.

“(He) spoke about how to utilize the tools that sports give them, importance of leadership on and off the field, and how they can accomplish

what he has and more,” Wilson said.

The Athletic Leadership Program is broken up into three seasons and brings together the team captains from each of the season’s sports at all levels (varsity, junior varsity and freshmen teams). The captains from the in-season sports meet two times a week with Wilson, who also performs grade checks once a week and offers additional academic support.

“During the leadership meetings, we use leadership curriculum that teaches the student-athletes how to strengthen, embrace and/or implement certain characteristics of leadership (that) we challenge them to use on campus, with their teammates, as well as off campus,” Wilson said. “The curriculum consists of relevant movie clips, team building activities, worksheets, current events, open discussions and past experiences.”

The program has also taken the students to the Pali Institute in San Bernardino where they were able to participate in a high ropes course, team-building activities and other leadership development opportunities.

The inaugural Eagle Games was such a success that Wilson is hoping to make it an annual event.

“It was a major success for our first run,” Wilson said. “I loved to hear all of the chatter from the kids about how fun and challenging the event was. There’s been a lot of participants asking, ‘Can we do this again next year?’

“My answer is, yes and it’s going to be bigger and better!”