The first 390 meters of the 4 x 400-meter relay at Friday’s St. Charles North boys track sectional went off without a problem. The last 10 were anything but typical.

Outside in the eighth lane, Hoffman Estates’ lead runner illegally cut down the track across four lanes, causing some, including Bartlett’s Josafat Gonzalez in lane four, to slow down.

The Hawks recovered for a fourth-place time of 3:25.08, but after the race, coaches and meet managers met to discuss how to resolve the mishap. Watch a video of the race to see which teams were most effected and subtract time? Re-run the race?

In the end no action was taken, and Bartlett’s time was less than a second off the state qualifying mark.

“We could have re-run the race but at this point in the meet you’re not going to re-run the mile relay,” Bartlett head coach Jeff Bral said of the meet’s final race. “The history of Bartlett has been close misses. Misses by seconds, by milliseconds.”

That was the case not only for the 4 x 400 of Gonzalez, Josh Hasenberg, Zach Konstanzer and Dan Karys but also for the 4 x 200 of Jasen Massey, Hasenberg, Konstanzer and Karys. That quartet also took fourth in 1:30.98, a second from state.

“I think we could have run better, but I know we all gave it our all today,” Massey said of the 4 x 200. “We were close. We fought with everything we had. I’m proud to run with those guys.”

“Obviously we would have loved to have our relays down there but we ran our best of the entire year,” Karys said. “We left it all out on the track. I wouldn’t have asked to end it any other way.”

Massey also came close to qualifying in the 200 dash, finishing eighth in 23.23, less than a second away from the state cut.

“I raced some of the top guys in the state,” Massey said of his 200 final. “I knew I had to keep up with them, and I knew it was going to be tough. I was very proud of myself getting to the finals.”

Close calls kept coming, from Ben Jalove in the 110 hurdles (fourth, 15.76) to Mike Romack in the 300 hurdles (seventh, 41.85) to Gonzalez in the 800 (ninth, 2:00.41) to Justin Jarosz (ninth, 53.3) and Zach Karys (10th, 53.72) in the 400. Jalove was a second from advancing, Romack was two seconds away, Gonzalez less than three seconds off and Jarosz and Zach Karys a little more than three seconds from qualifying.

The 4 x 100 relay of Brandon Burck, Zach Karys, Rob Trotter and Chris Baumann finished sixth in 44.92, a bit more than a second from qualifying.

Disappointment and close calls weren’t the only story for the Hawks.

Senior Dan Karys won the long jump by going 23 feet, 4 inches, more than a foot better than the state cut. He took second in the triple jump with a mark of 44-11 and came close to hitting the qualifying standard of 45 feet (top two finishers in every sectional event automatically advance).

“It was interesting,” Karys said of his triple jump experience. “I had to run the 4 x 200 beforehand, then I got three jumps in and scratched on one. I didn’t do as well as I wanted to there and then I had to go run the 4 x 400 before finals. When I came back I didn’t have much left. I just stuck it out and I hope to do better (this weekend).

“I would have loved to go down with the relays, but I’m happy nonetheless.”

In other field events Brian Polubinski (fourth, 49 3-3/4) and Brendan Bauers (fifth, 47 11-3/4) had strong efforts and scored for the Hawks in the shot put, as did Kevin Bauers in the discus (fifth, 147-2).