Culver City Observer -

For the past 12 years the Culver City girls track and field teams have climbed to the top of the high school track and field world. Under the guidance of former girls' head coach Rayfield M. Beaton the Centaurs have been in the spotlight every year. Beaton was a world class runner who attended USC.

Now another world class runner, Lashinda Demus has stepped in to coach the girls and she has continued to keep the light burning as bright as ever. The No. 1 ranked CIF Division 2 Centaurs showed the nation last weekend at the prestigious Arcadia Invitational that they can compete with the best of the best.

The main reason they are so good is Joelle Trepagnier. Trepagnier ran the fastest time in the nation in the 400 meters last Saturday and she also helped her team place second in the 4X400 meter relay and sixth in the 4X100 meter relay. She recorded the fastest time out of 48 girls and her teammate, Morgan Maddox had the 23rd best time of 57.30 in 400 meters.

Trepagnier, a sophomore, also ran a very impressive second leg in the 4X400 meter relay. The other three members of the relay were senior Imaan Minwalla, freshman Leena Powell and Maddox who is a junior. "We wanted to see her get into the 53's," said long time boys head coach Jahmal Wright this week. "She is capable of running in the 52's. It's scary to think about what she can do when it's all said and done." Their 4X400 relay time of 3:49.77 was the second-best time out of 37 schools and their time of 47.1 in the 4X100 relay was sixth best out of 76 schools.

Over half of the track and field team will be in action this weekend at the South Bay Relays at West Torrance high school. The freshman and sophomores will compete on Friday and the varsity runners and jumpers will perform on Saturday. The meet on Saturday will start at 5 p.m.

The Centaur baseball is currently 7-8-1 and they will be looking to reach the .500 mark when they battle Peninsula this week. They travel to Peninsula for as 3:15 p.m. game on Friday. They stay on the road for two more games when they face Gardena Serra on Saturday at 2 p.m. and they play Palos Verdes on Wednesday at 3:15 p.m. Last Saturday they played one of the longest games in Culver City baseball history when they battled Banning. At the end of four hours the game ended in a 4-4 tie.

Head coach Devaughn Wallace had this to say about the marathon game. "The players were a little tired but they were able to see that they had a lot of fight in them. They saw what can happen if they work hard and put in the effort. It was fight after fight after fight. It was a real barn burner."

The boys' volleyball team is having its annual Tournament on Saturday starting with their 8 a.m. game against Lawndale. At 10 a.m. they battle Maywood and at 12 p.m. they face Hawthorne. All the games will be played inside the Culver City High School gymnasium.

The girls' softball team will play Marymount at 3:30 p.m. at home on Friday and on Monday they travel to Santa Monica for a 3:30 game. The girls' lacrosse team will travel to the play Palisades on Friday at 3:30 p.m. and on Wednesday they will stay on the road against El Segundo at 3:30 p.m. The boys' lacrosse team will face Birmingham at 5 p.m. on Thursday (Today) and El Segundo on Wednesday at 5 p.m. Both games will be played at Culver City high school.