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Glen Strandberg
Sports Editor
In less than a minute, they went from the best of times, to their worst of times.
At last Friday’s state track and field meet, Forest Lake’s record-breaking 400-meter relay team went from being one of the favorites, to falling to last place in its heat and not making the finals.
The exchange between Mitch Koenig and Dan Blaser came to a near standstill, which then led to another poor handoff between Blaser and Dalton Keep on the third leg of the relay. By the time Dillon Grant took the baton for the anchor, the Rangers had little chance of passing the fastest teams in Minnesota.
The foursome had taken first at the State True Team competition, and went on to set records at the Suburban East Conference Meet as well as the Section 7AA championships. On June 5 they would have to settle for a posting of 44.73, which put them in 10th place overall.
 But it wasn’t all bad news for Forest Lake.
Opening day started off with Kenny Klein making the finals of the shot put, where he squared off against the big, big boys who were reaching the mid-50s and even crossing the 60-foot mark.
MR. BIG SHOT: Kenny Klein would survive the first flight of the shot put competition, and end up taking ninth place at the state track and field meet.
Klein held his own and wound up on the medal stand in ninth place, after finishing his high school career with his best effort of 51-2.25.
Josh Nielsen and Keep made it past the preliminaries in their solo events, where Nielsen would land in eighth place in Saturday’s final of the 400 meters (50.73), while Keep took sixth in the 200 meters (22.55).
Combined with Klein’s finish in the shot put, the Rangers would close the meet with a team total of seven points.
Other Forest Lake competitors who did not move out of the prelims were the 800-meter relay team (Brandon Brambilla, Jimmy Plain, Nielsen and Mark Buerkle), Calvin Larson in the shot, and Luke Daninger in the discus.
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