Maria Kropf of Sweet Home placed sixth in the girls 13-14 100 meters in the Hershey’s Track and Field Games North American Finals on Aug. 5 in Hershey, Pa.
Kropf ran 13.37 in a tight race that saw the top six finishers all within one-third of a second of each other. The winner was Tanish Wilson, of Atlanta, Ga., who ran 13.04.
Her mother, Leona Kropf, said her daughter wasn’t feeling well on the day of the race.
Maria Kropf ran 12.59 in the Hershey’s regional meet in July to qualify for the nationals.
“I’m disappointed, but I’ll accept it,” Maria Kropf said of her finish. “Overall it was fun. I thank God for my sxth place. Without Him, I couldn’t have done this.”
It was Kropf’s second time in the finals, where she placed fifth last year as a 12-year-old.
She said this year’s event turned out to be a great experience, particularly the tour of Chocolate World and getting to meet some Olympic athletes.
She said she saw Olympic gold medalists Carl Lewis, Sonya Richards and Crystal Cox and got autographs from a number of top-flight runners.
One of them was Jason Lunn, a former 1500 outdoors champion, who ran last Tuesday in the Road to Eugene meet in Eugene. Kropf said Lunn sat next to one of the Hershey’s participants on the flight back to Oregon.
“Since it was my last year, it was good to see all that stuff before I left,” she said.
“The race was really good, even though I took sixth. I’ll take it. Last year’s girls weren’t back, so I had some new competition.”
The top finisher from Oregon was Hannah Russo of Roseburg, who won the 11-12 girls 100 meters, in 13.85.