Londonderry High School boys’ junior track and field standout Starlin Ortiz capped off his fine 2014 outdoor season in exceptional fashion recently, winning the state decathlon championship at Nashua High School South.
The boys’ 58th annual state decathlon and the 38th state heptathlon for female track and field athletes took place at Nashua South over two days – Saturday and Sunday, June 21 and 22 – and Ortiz wound up tops out of a field of 75 competitors from across the state.
Londonderry High also had two young ladies perform well in the heptathlon, and one of them was Ortiz’s younger sister Yorgelis. She and fellow Lady Lancer sophomore trackster Jackie Luckhardt finished among the top dozen athletes in the heptathlon, which had a field of 61 competitors.
The elder Ortiz had a bang-up first day of  the decathlon, amassing 3,229 points in the first five events to lead Will Merchant of Lebanon by some 223 points going into day two of action.
The LHS Lancer was victorious in three of those first five events on day one with wins in the 100-meter dash, the long jump, and the high jump. Knowing he wouldn’t be strong in the later throwing events, Ortiz sought to bank as many points as possible in his strong events, which he succeeded in doing.
The Londonderry High star then snagged his fourth win of the weekend in the first event of day two – the 110-meter hurdles – but he then saw his lead diminish due to weaker finishes in the discus, pole vault, javelin, and 1,500-meter run.
But when all events had been completed, the native of the Dominican Republic finished with 64 points more than runner-up Merchant (5,836 to 5,772).
A Lebanon trackster did wind up winning the heptathlon title, however, thanks to the fine work of young Corrine Kennedy, who snagged that crown with a point tally of 4,284 points. But the Londonderry High girls’ track and field program has plenty of reasons to be proud of the facts that sophomore Luckhardt – who was a key member of the Lady Lancers’ Division I title-winning girls’ basketball team during the winter season – and Yorgelis Ortiz finished a fine eighth and 12th respectively.
On day one of their competition, the young women competed in the 110-meter hurdles, the high jump, the shot, and the 200-meter dash, and on day two they took on the long jump, the javelin, and the 800-meter run.
Luckhardt wound up with a strong final point tally of 3,359 points, while Ortiz ended up with a count of 3,238.