Astoria’s Colton McMaster ‘had a bad day’ throwing … and yet he won 4A boys titles in the shot put and discus
By René Ferrán
Astoria senior Colton McMaster stood in line at 8:15 a.m. Friday morning to get his discs weighed in time for the start of the Class 4A discus competition at the OSAA track and field championships at Hayward Field in Eugene.
He figured he had enough time to get weigh-ins done before the 9 a.m. start of his event.
He figured wrong.
“By the time I’m almost to the door to get them weighed, they’re calling me over, saying I have like seven minutes to go,” he said. “I took three warmup throws, then started throwing.”
He used another competitor’s discus for his first attempt, tried another’s for his second, and then a third discus for the third.
And like Goldilocks, the third one was just right — or at least right enough for this day. He threw 156 feet, 2 inches, on that third throw to take the lead going to the finals, and sticking with that discus for the final rounds, he uncorked a 177-0 to seal the title.
“I was thinking about everything I shouldn’t, and then someone got out ahead of me, and I was getting a little bit nervous,” McMaster said. “But I finally got that 177 out, and while I’m not complacent, I’m happy with how I performed.
“I’m always more nervous for the discus because it’s less consistent. You can have a bad series, like you saw, and that’s the way it could be. I’m just fortunate enough to have my bad ones be good enough to get me where I need to be.”
McMaster then entered the stadium for the shot put, and again, while he did enough to head home with a second state title, his winning throw of 55-0¾ was more than five feet shorter than his personal best from a month ago at the Jesuit Twilight Relays.
“Today, I don’t know, I just had a bad day,” said McMaster, who will compete at Dartmouth next year. “But winning both, that’s important to me, especially after not having this the last couple of years.”
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