Performances of the Week | March 31 - April 6
After a week full of fast times and personal bests, it's time once again to highlight some of the top performances of the week! These performances aren't necessarily the best marks, but rather ones that will impress fans of the sport. Just like last week, the six performances are scattered across all event groups.
Throws
Leading the way in the throws this week is Centralia's Daegan Steinlage. He competed both on Tuesday and Friday, pulling off a double-double and accumulating 4 gold medals across Discus and Shot Put. Tuesday was no doubt a good day, posting 1A-leading marks just shy of PR's. Those PR's would fall in due time, specifically on Friday at Frankfort. The senior put the shot just over 49 feet, topping his teammate's mark in 2nd place by over 6 feet. His discus throw of 172' 7'' was a comfy 23 feet ahead of the silver medal toss.
Hurdles
The impressive hurdler this week was Jack Mull. The Winfield senior smoked the entire field at Maize South on Friday. Who needs to run preliminary heats when you can just blow everybody away the first time? He dashed to a 14.91 in the 110's, two seconds ahead of second place. The 300m hurdle performance of 40.43 was no different, he had time to go eat dinner before the second place runner crossed in 44.16. In case that wasn't enough, he cleared 12'6'' in the pole vault, claiming the gold medal there as well.
Sprints
It was a difficult decision to put her on here this early in the season, since she's likely got even more crazy speed up her sleeve, but Dhakiya Blake's debut this week was too good to pass up. The Leavenworth freshman showed just a peek of her speed at home on Monday in her 400m victory. That was great and all, but Friday at Lansing was just something special. She came out of the blocks on a mission with preliminary heats that were never in doubt. Her prelim 200m time of 25.42 is the fastest in Kansas so far this season, and her fastest ever. She would go on to win both events in the finals over stiff competition from Ottawa and Emporia.
Distance
Our distance performance of the week comes from a rising sophomore. Tommy Hazen from St. Thomas Aquinas had a career day at the Shawnee Mission South Relays on Monday. He started the day with a silver medal in the 1600m, pushing Sam Hubert, an established distance power, to the wire. After that, he decided that losing to good runners wasn't really his thing. He blasted a 9:37 to edge out Gardner-Edgerton star Trent Cochran by half a second. STA's distance dynasty is in good hands with this rising star.
Jumps
Boy, were there plenty of jumpers to choose from this week.
You had to have some massive spring in your step this week to find your way
into the performance of the week. Maddie Righter, an Olathe Northwest senior, did just that and more in
Emporia on Monday. Her high jump of 5'10'' was no April Fool's joke, and she
backed it up with a state-leading long jump of 19'5''. She had 10 more jumps in
her as she went over some hurdles to win the 100m hurdles, and to cap it all
off she earned a 4th gold medal in the 200m dash.
Of course, with such a great week for jumpers a male jumper earned the final
slot. Last, but not least, Nasjon Porter from Bonner Springs pulled off a
double-double to open the season this week. He won both the Long and Triple
jumps at Baldwin and Basehor-Linwood. His leaps of 23'0.5'' (long) on Monday
and 45'9'' (triple) on Friday were the best of his career, and currently lead
the state.