#52 - A Record Number of Michigan Olympians!

Inside this Issue

• Michigan Rocks The Trials

• Our Olympians Under Other Flags

• The Most Ever?

• Well, This is Awkward…

• The Summer Prep Scene

• The Archive Groweth

• Check Out The Year Lists

• The Latest College Signings

• Other Things

• Support This Newsletter and Our Historical Efforts!

Michigan Rocks At The Trials!

If you’re like me, your head is still spinning from the incredible performances we saw at the Olympic Trials. Our Michigan representatives overachieved in a big way. Here’s a quick look at where they came from and where they are now:

Heath Baldwin - A 2019 graduate of Kalamazoo Hackett, Baldwin won D4 state titles in the 110H, 300H, HJ and LJ. Naturally, he started training for the decathlon at Michigan, and got even more serious about the 10-eventer when he transferred to Michigan State. In 2021 he did his first decathlon, scoring 7261. He improved to 7611 at the Big 10 meet that year and placed 11th in the NCAA. The next year he improved marginally to 7650. Then last year he jumped up to 8084 and also placed 5th in the NCAA. After opening this season with a huge 8470 breakthrough, he opted to focus on the Trials, where he steamrollered the opposition to win with 8625 points. It’s the most ever scored by a Michigander and he became the first collegian to win the Trials since 1956.

Anna Cockrell - She never attended high school in Michigan but she was certainly a part of the high school indoor season while a middle schooler at Detroit Country Day. In 2012 she placed 5th in the MITS Indoor Finals at 60H, clocking 9.00 in a race won by future Olympian Cindy Ofili (Sember). Later that year she won the 55H and 200H at the Oakland County Middle School Championships. She attended high school in North Carolina and college at USC, where she was a 5-time NCAA champion. At the ‘21 Olympics, she made the final of the 400H but was disqualified for a lane violation. At the Trials, she ran consecutive PRs of 52.95 & 52.64; no Michigander has ever run faster.

Freddie Crittenden - He spent his last two years of high school in Utica, where he won the 2013 D1 state 110H title in a modest 14.36 (into a 2.6 wind). His prep PR was 14.10 (plus a 37.38 for 300H). Indoors he won the New Balance Nationals with his 7.72, which broke Kenneth Ferguson’s state record of 7.75. It still stands as the state record. At Syracuse he was a 4-time ACC champion and an NCAA runner-up. Since then he has been a journeyman hurdler, often unsponsored, grinding his way to the top. The first Michigander to break 13.00, his 12.93 for 2nd at the Trials came in his seventh year as a pro. My 2020 feature on Crittenden.

Andrew Evans - A 2-time D1 discus champ for Portage Northern, Evans had prep PRs of 61-3.5 & 192-7. At Kentucky he was a 2-time SEC champion and 3rd in the NCAA. He continued after graduation and made the Rio Olympic team, placing 16th in qualifying. After losing his sponsorship, he disappeared from the sport for 4 years. He reemerged in ‘22, winning the USATF title. His victory at the Trials was the first-ever in the discus by a Michigander. He threw his PR 223-4 in Ann Arbor in April. He works full-time as a brewer at WaxWings in Kalamazoo.

Grant Fisher - One of the superstars of Michigan prep history, Fisher’s high school exploits need no introduction. He has steadily grown in international stature, and with his double victory at the Trials seems to have developed into the kind of runner who can make an Olympic podium, able to hang with any pace and skilled at kicking off a brutally hard pace. He is the American Record holder at both of his Paris events, 5000 (12:46.96) and 10,000 (26:33.84). Our ‘22 interview with Fisher.

Hobbs Kessler - The wunderkind of the pandemic, the Ann Arbor Skyline alum had a very atypical high school career. Like everyone his age, he lost a year of normal high school competition to the pandemic, a period he entered as a 4:20-ish miler and emerged as the best teen runner in U.S. history. He opted to go pro rather than compete collegiately, and now 21, that decision has been vindicated. He is the first American male to qualify in the 800 and 1500 in the same Olympic Trials since 1976. His Trials performances displayed an impressive grasp of the art of tactics in middle distance running. First he placed 3rd in the 1500 in 3:31.53, then he took 2nd in the 800 in 1:43.64. The Kessler origin story.

Grace Stark - At Lakeland High, Stark made herself a prep legend with a state record 13.16 in the hurdles along with a win at the Youth Olympics in Argentina. At Florida, she showed early signs of greatness with an NCAA Indoor win in 2022, but that was all derailed when she broke her leg at the SEC meet that spring. After multiple surgeries and a long rehab process, she emerged very hungry to be better than ever this season. She made herself one of the best hurdlers in the world with an NCAA win followed by her Trials 3rd in a PR 12.31. Our talk with Grace pre-injury in 2022.

Worth noting that there are others with Michigan connections on the team, most notably Eastern Michigan alum Donald Scott in the triple jump. Also, on the team staff is Pioneer/UM grad Chris Yee, who is a licensed massage therapist.

Our Olympians Under Other Flags

It’s not a new phenomenon for a Michigan high school alum to compete for another country at the Olympics. The first was Detroit Northern’s George “Buck” Hester, who won the state 100/220 double in 1922 and ‘23, then represented Canada in the ‘24 and ‘28 Olympics. Lately, though, there is definitely a growing trend in this direction, perhaps because of the growing diversity of our population in the state. One not included in our list of this year’s Olympians will be Oak Park/Michigan hurdle star Aasia Laurencin, who got her clearance to represent the island nation of St. Lucia this season, but not in time to make it to Paris.

Dubem Amene - At Southfield Christian, Amene was the 2019 D4 state champion at 400. The Big 10 champion for Michigan this year, he ran a PR 45.36 after his collegiate career concluded and then captured the Nigerian championship in 45.44. He did not make the Olympic standard in the individual 400, but has been named to Nigeria’s 4 × 400 squad.

Udodi Onwuzurike - At Brother Rice, he was a sprint sensation, winning the D1 100/200 in 2021. He holds the current state records at 10.23 & 20.21. He competed for two years at Stanford, winning the 2023 NCAA 200 title in his PR 19.76. He will be competing for the Nigerian team in the 200 and is expected to run on the 4 × 100 as well. He has a 100 PR of 9.92.

Alex Rose - In 2009, he won the D2 state shot title for Ogemaw Heights. He later starred at Central Michigan. As a pro, he has specialized in the discus while representing Samoa. This will be his third Olympics. He has made the finals of the last two World Championships. He threw his PR of 234-6 (71.48) at Grand Valley in May—that mark puts him at No. 2 in the world this season.

Cindy Sember - As Cindy Ofili, she won D1 crowns for Ann Arbor Huron in 2012 in both hurdle races. At Michigan, she won the 2016 NCAA Indoor race, along with a mountain of Big 10 honors. Like her older sister Tiffany Porter did, she represents Great Britain internationally. She placed 4th in the Rio Olympics. In Tokyo she made it to the semis. This year, she won the British title to clinch her third Olympic team.

Well, This Is Awkward…

Personally I love helping to spread enthusiasm for the contribution Michigan is making to the Olympics. It thrills me to see widespread awareness of all of our Olympians, something that wasn’t happening 20 years ago. All the folks gushing about these great athletes on social media, posing for selfies with them at the Trials, etc. That is all tremendously cool and is part of the reason Michtrack exists.

Yet there’s a little touch of irony to it all I find darkly amusing. Going back to these Olympians’ high school days, I personally remember hearing various coaches criticize at least five of them for working with “private coaches” during their high school years. Every case was different; sometimes it was with their official school coach’s blessing, sometimes it was more like begrudging acceptance. In one case the grumbling played a factor in the athlete not getting the annual MITCA Mr/Ms Track & Field award. I even remember one coach bragging to me that if he were the guy in charge at X High, he would “kick that damn kid off the team!”

So nice to see that everyone’s a fan now that it turns out these athletes were making good choices after all!

(Not going into the always-heated private coach debate here; some day I will. However, if you need a taste of it, just search through the Michigan coaches group on Facebook. The argument erupts there from time to time.)

The Most Ever?

Indeed. Our 11 Olympians (in a total of 14 events) marks the biggest group ever from the Great Lakes State, topping the 8 we had for the 2021 Games. These are banner years for our state. It wasn’t so long ago (2000, in fact) when we sent zero athletes. That year ended a streak of always having a Michigander at the Olympics since 1904 (the only other year we struck out was the first, 1896). Of course, there’s also 1980, the year that the U.S. boycotted the Games, but steepler Doug Brown (a grad of Harper Woods Notre Dame 1971), was named to the squad that went nowhere.

Here’s the complete list of our 55 track & field Olympians from Michigan, along with their results in the Games.

The Summer Prep Scene

USATF MI Junior Olympics (6/22): Oakland University hosted the event. Rence Leon-Fountain triple jumped 39-3, and Sam Mitas ran 10.82w in the heats.

AAU Junior Olympic Regional (6/27-30): At Renaissance, the kids stole the show. In the age 14 400m, 7th grader Cayla Hawkins blistered a state-leading 54.48 to top 8th-grader Janae Coleman and her 54.60. For Hawkins, that’s a 7th-grade state record. According to Athletic-net, they are the top 2 middle schoolers in the nation. Coleman also won the 200 in 24.97 and the 800 in 2:15.29.

The older athletes fared well too. Aubrey Wilson (11.97) and Kamryn Tatum (11.98) led the 100. Tatum turned the tables in the 200 (24.27w-24.51w). Carrie VanNoy took both hurdles (14.40w/62.85). Notable marks on the boys side went to Bryce Hurley (10.60w after a legal 10.63 heat) plus a legal state-leading 21.28 in the 200 (No. 18 in state history). Rondre Austion ran 48.55 for 400 and Zacchaeus Brocks 13.81w in the hurdles. Teegan Simmons threw the javelin 158-2 and Quincy Isaac long jumped 24-0w.

Tiki Vault (June 29): Wins to Tryce Tokar (15-6) and Kenzie Fedewa (12-6), with preps Isabel German and Aubree Bowers both clearing 12-0.

AAU Club Championships (July 9-13): Held in Jacksonville, Florida, just a few Michigan kids attended. Carrie VanNoy improved to 61.57 in the 400 hurdles. Nevaeh Burns ran 55.84 and Janae Coleman 55.29.

Grand Haven Beach Vault (July 12-13): Top Michigan preps were Reece Emeott (14-9) and Isabel German (12-3), and our top pros were Trevor Stephenson (17-6) and Kristen Leland (14-0).

Courageous Games (July 14): Fast 200s to Jeremy Dixon (21.65w) and Noah Morris (21.71w), and Ahmad Ahmeen ran 47.92 for one lap. Maddy Piotrowski PRed at 57.25. Celeste Davis hurdled 14.88 and Alysia Townsend jumped 5-6.

The Archive Groweth

The Michtrack Results Archive continues to grow, with over 400 results added this week for a total of 11,726 results preserved for history. Which, of course, is a reminder to you coaches with the summer off—scan your old results and get them to us so that they can be permanently preserved! And if your results are in an old box that your spouse wants you to get out of the basement, please, just donate them to us. We can even give you a receipt so that you can deduct the donation on your taxes. Eventually, when time permits (or when we get the funding to hire someone to help us with scanning), we will get them scanned and into the Archive. Give us a shout, please.

Check Out The Year List Collection

Yup, not just the 2024 year lists, but all of them. We have recently cleaned up that page and corrected all the links messed up in our website move earlier this year. We have also added lists for a bunch of years “back in the day.”

For a long time now, whenever time permits, I dig deep into our resources to recreate a top 10+ list for the years before Michtrack was a thing. We think this is an invaluable resource—a quick, one-stop shop to see what the track & field landscape looked like that year, who the big names were, who the record breakers were, etc. It’s the ultimate rabbit hole, where I can lose myself for many hours. When I want to waste time because a big writing deadline is staring me down, it’s what I do.

There’s a long way to go in this process, and your support is essential to making it happen.

The Latest College Signings

The Michtrack website now features a complete list of all the signings reported all year, so you can easily check if someone appears there. We are including all Michigan HS grads who are planning to compete in track and/or XC at the college level. Also included are all-state level TF/XC athletes who are planning to do their college competition in sports other than track (with their college sport noted).

• Mill Coleman III (GR Catholic Central) - Eastern Michigan

• Sofia Figueroa (Wayne Memorial) - Detroit Mercy

• Dylan Lafontsee (Cedar Springs) - Grand Valley

• Chloe May (Pickford) - Cornerstone

• Yasmine Priester (Summit Academy) - Lawrence Tech

Other Things

Mark Rinker, who had been men’s XC head coach and assistant track coach at Eastern Michigan, has been named head XC coach and assistant track coach at Elon University in North Carolina.

Gina McNamara, the Northville/UM alum who now represents Malta internationally, won the Maltese Championships triple recently, taking the 1500 (4:42.22) and the next day the 800 (2:14.26) and 5000 (17:27.84). The previous weekend she medaled in all three events at the Championships of the Small States of Europe, winning the 1500 (4:45.43), 2nd in the 5000 (18:02.62) and 3rd in the 800 (2:09.09).

Those Track & Field News links: I include them when they’re relevant, and sure, I’d like you all to subscribe to the magazine which pays my rent. However, I know many of you don’t, and might get frustrated because you get locked out after a few links. FYI-There is a limit of three articles per month, per device. If you hit the limit on your phone you can go to your laptop, etc. You can even use a different browser. Or a VPN.

The Missing #49: Got all excited about reaching #52 in the newsletter count, because that’s a year’s worth of weekly newsletters. Yeah, cheesy, since we’re actually only “weekly” and there are plenty of weeks where we just don’t have time. But stat nuts that we are, we have to admit that “#52” itself is bogus, since somehow we skipped #49. Don’t know how that happened!

New Ways To Support The Cause! We have been approved by Venmo and Paypal to accept charitable donations (tax-deductible) through their services. We hope this will make it easier for small, occasional contributions—and help normalize leaving a tip when folks send research questions our way. All the links and details here.