Current Bordentown
JULY 2025 FREE
Hard work helps Hardy reach Meet of Champs Bordentown discus thrower wins sectional title to advance to states BY JuStIn FeIl Some track and field throwers are naturally gifted. Raylyn Hardy was not. But over four years, she worked to become the secondbest girls discus thrower in the history of Bordentown Regional High School. The Scotties senior sealed her climb and her career by capturing a sectional championship and advancing for the first time to the pinnacle of the state’s sport, the Meet of Champions. “It meant, like, a lot for me,” said Hardy. “It felt like I accomplished something very big because going from freshman year, not going to any meets, to then going to Meet of Champs, being with the best girls in the state, I truly feel like I accomplished a lot. I built up all that confidence, built up all that momentum to just get where I was at the end of my senior season. It just kind of felt like a breath of relief when I finally made it.” It was quite the journey. Hardy, who could trace her ath-
letic career back further in field hockey and basketball, came out for track and field at the request of Bill Lloyd, the throws coach who also coaches the Scotties girls basketball team. Lloyd makes his newcomers try all three throws — shot put, discus and javelin — to see which best suits them. “A lot of times, I’ll know in three practices whether this kid’s got it,” Lloyd said. “And Raylyn struggled. Me and her joke about it, even to this day. She didn’t come in and have natural ability. She really had to work at it. And the jumps she made from freshman to sophomore year and then sophomore to junior year were exponential.” Hardy was taking so long to adjust to throws as a freshman that Bordentown didn’t have her compete in the big weekend meets. But when she started to think about the following year, she found that she wanted to use the tools like her 6-foot frame that she did have. “I looked like a thrower and I looked like I was strong, so why not come out for the throwing?” she said. “But I guess in reality, I wasn’t really that strong with it. I just didn’t really get the groove of things. I just really wasn’t that passionate my freshman year. But then it did kind of hit me See HARDY, Page 8
COMMUNITYNEWS.ORG
un-believable
Bordentown Regional High School’s Model UN club received multiple awards at this year’s Central Jersey Model United Nations/Congress. Pictured are (front row) Gabriella Cuccia, Kashika Manak, Ryan Barcellona, Emilie Kelly, Sruthi Thota, Athiva Manteena, Hasini Gokavarapu, Anna Rivera, Riddhi Rajpal and (back row) Julianna Morolda, Grace Kennedy, Hansika Gokavarapu, Kade Sutton, Simond Lulu and Zion Scott. Story, page 4.
Community reacts to closure of Fox House Brewing after 3 months BY JOe eMAnSKI Fox House Brewing, which opened in Bordentown City in March two years after it was first announced, was set to close its doors on June 29. Owner Chris Campbell made the surprise announcement on Instagram on June 17. He cited the failure of his brewing system
See our ad on pg 3
as the main culprit, although not the only one. Here is his post in full: “Fox House will be closing permanently on Sunday, June 29th. “NJ brewery laws require that you have a location, zoning variance, all the build out done, and a certificate of occupancy with all the equipment installed before
a license is issued. This is while paying rent the whole time. As I’m sure you remember, opening Fox House took way longer than anticipated. So I had to skimp on brewhouse equipment with the intention of buying something more reliable later on. But it collapsed last week. While I could buy a new system today, it would See BReWeRY, Page 6
Now Open! see our ad on page 19
PRSRT STD U.S. POSTAGE PAID SPRINGFIELD, MA 1179 PERMIT NO. 142 NEWARK, NJ