The blue oval at Drake Stadium in Des Moines will be full of area athletes for the 2018 State track meet beginning Thursday.

The Washington Demon boys will have Ethan Hunt in the 400 and the shuttle hurdle relay team of Mario Tapia, Lincoln Kleese, Ethan Hunt and Ben Schiefer in action.

The Washington girls will see Hannah Anderson in the 200m dash.

The Mid-Prairie boys will be busy with Floyd Evans running the 3200, Terrhyn Jacoby the 100, Cary Schaefer and Quinn Schmidt the 400 and the 4×800 team of Zach Pettit, Marshall Teets, Schmidt and Peyton Miller will also be in action.

The Mid-Prairie girls will be represented by Abbagail Evans in the 400, Anna and Marie Hostetler in the 3000 and the team of Kate Cavanagh, Kessa Jones, Moriah Brase and Ana Fleming in the 4×800 relay.

On the track Thursday for Iowa Mennonite will be Levi Geyer in the 3200 and Suzanna Yoder in both the 100 and 400.

The Highland Huskies have girls in a pair of events with Emily Yahnke in the 100 and Yahnke and Aly Stokes in the long jump Thursday.

The Lone Tree Lions have three events competing at Drake Stadium Thursday including Brady Dauber in the long jump, Casey Shalla in the shot put, and the 4×800 team of Dauber, Harmon Miller, Keegan Edwards and Brock Smith.

The WACO Warriors will see Elijah McGohan in the 400, the boys shuttle team of John Skriver, McGohan, Drew Kissell and Colton Horak and the girls shuttle hurdle team of Kiana Miller, Grace Conwell, Laney Graber and Molly McLaughlin compete Thursday.

For Winfield-Mt. Union it’s Brandon Snowden in the 100, 200 and 400 and Anna Hudson in the shot put Thursday.

The Sigourney girls begin the defense of their class 1A state title with Autum Barthelman in the 100, Summer Barthelman in the long jump and the shuttle hurdle team of Autum and Summer Barthelman, Sloane Magill, and Leah Carter in action Thursday.

KCII will have updates throughout the day with the latest results from the state track meet in Des Moines. The one to count on for today’s local sports coverage is AM and FM KCII.