Pope's Fleming Repeats as State 1600 Champ

Patrick Fleming of Pope High School and Tray Oates of Allatoona High School repeated as state champions in the 1,600-meter run and the pole vault, respectively, as the Georgia High School Association boys state track and field meet got underway Thursday in Jefferson.

Two other athletes from Cobb schools -- Jaylan Reid of Hillgrove High School (shot put) and Joey Connors of Harrison High School (discus) -- won state crowns in Class AAAAAA.

While Fleming repeated as the 1,600 champion in the second-largest classification -- now Class AAAAA -- Oates retained his crown by prevailing over an expanded group of contenders. Allatoona, which competed in Class AAA last year, moved up to what is now Class AAAAA.

Fleming clocked in with a time of 4:15.58, while Oates' winning feat was 16 feet, 1 inch. Fleming has qualified for the finals of the Class AAAAA 800-meter run on Saturday.

More here from The Marietta Daily Journal on those victories and other strong Cobb finishers.

In the Class AAAAAA 1,600-meter run, Kenan Farmer and Brian Sullivan of Walton finished in second and third, respectively.

For a full list of finishers in all events, visit the GHSA's boys track results page.

Friday's action in Jefferson was devoted mainly to running preliminaries, with finals scheduled for Saturday. You can watch Saturday's competition live on GHSA.tv.

Patch will update those results later this weekend.