TRACK AND FIELD / JOHN ORTEGA : Injury Behind Her, Aparicio Looks Ahead

Maribella Aparicio is not dwelling on the past as she approaches her freshman cross-country season at Brigham Young.

Aparicio, who as a junior finished second in the girls’ 3,200-meter race at the 1992 state track championships, had her senior season at Fillmore High cut short because of torn ligaments in her right ankle. The injury forced her to withdraw from the Masters Meet, which serves as the Southern Section’s qualifying event for the state championships.

Aparicio suffered the injury in the Southern Section Division IV preliminaries when she twisted her ankle after leaping over a fallen runner, yet she managed to win the Division IV title the following week.

“It didn’t really bother me that much in the (Southern Section) finals,” she said. “But the following week, it really started to hurt.”

Aparicio and her father Ben, who serves as her personal coach, were hopeful that the injury would respond to rest. When it failed to heal, she withdrew from the Masters Meet the night before the race.

“It was sad because I wanted to run in the state meet,” Aparicio said. “But it wouldn’t have made any sense to run in the Masters Meet. I wouldn’t have been able to run any faster than about (11 minutes 30 seconds). I also didn’t want to do anything that would jeopardize my freshman season (at BYU).”

With the injury behind her, Aparicio is running eight to nine miles a day, five or six days a week--her Mormon faith prohibits her from running on Sundays--and is eagerly anticipating the fall cross-country season.

“I haven’t really set a whole bunch of goals,” she said. “I just want to run faster than I did last season. It should be fun.”

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Strength in numbers: Olympic champions Kevin Young of Reseda, Quincy Watts of Calabasas, Jackie Joyner-Kersee of Canoga Park and Gail Devers of Mission Hills head a list of 10 athletes from the area who will compete in the World Championships at Stuttgart, Germany, Aug. 14-22.

Although Watts--a 1988 graduate of Taft High--and Donna Mayhew of Glendale--a 1978 graduate of Crescenta Valley High--are the only athletes in the group with high school or college ties to the region, it is nonetheless an impressive list.

Watts (400 meters and 1,600 relay), Young (400 intermediate hurdles), Joyner-Kersee (heptathlon) and Devers (100) won gold medals in last year’s Olympic Games in Barcelona.

Johnny Gray of Agoura Hills was the bronze medalist in the 800 in Barcelona and Kenny Harrison of Mission Hills is the defending world champion in the triple jump, having bounded 58 feet 4 inches in the 1991 World Championships in Tokyo.

Also expected to compete in Germany are Mark Crear (110 high hurdles) and Jon Drummond of Sherman Oaks (400 relay), Dannette Young of Canoga Park (women’s 200 and 400 relay) and Mayhew (javelin).

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Tougher road to hoe: Watts moved to second on the all-time world list when he timed 43.50 seconds to win the 400 in the Olympics last year, but things have not gone as smoothly this season.

He struggled to a third-place finish in the 400 in the USA Track & Field championships in June and his performances were inconsistent during the first half of the season.

Much of that inconsistency stemmed from excess weight. The 6-foot-3 Watts, who weighed 188 last year in Barcelona, was 17 pounds heavier at the USATF meet.

His weight now is reportedly near 190.

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Vaquero roundup: Glendale College’s men’s track team will be bolstered by the return of distance runner Hugo Allan Garcia and the addition of sprinter Craig Harzmann next season.

As a freshman, Garcia won the 1990 state junior college cross-country title for Glendale and finished second in the 10,000 meters in the 1991 state track championships.

He added an eighth-place finish in the 1991 state cross-country meet before withdrawing from school to return to his native Guatemala. He hopes to continue his collegiate career at either Adams State (Colo.) or Azusa Pacific after earning his Associate of Arts degree at Glendale.

Harzmann timed 10.83 in the 100 meters, 21.62 in the 200 and 48.65 in the 400 for Glendale High in 1992, but struggled as a Mt. San Antonio College freshman this season, running 10.94, 21.84 and 49.80.

“I loved my coaches there,” Harzmann said. “They were great people, but their training program just didn’t work for me.”

Living on his own, away from his family and friends in Glendale, also proved difficult for Harzmann.

“I just feel more comfortable up here with my family and friends,” Harzmann said. “I guess I’ll just chalk it up to experience.”

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Name change: The Kinney national high school cross-country championships, which began in 1979, will be known as the Foot Locker cross-country championships starting this year.

Foot Locker, which is part of Kinney Shoe Corp., is more closely associated with high school sports than Kinney.

This year’s championships are Dec. 11 at San Diego’s Morley Field.