RICHMOND, VA -- If you are an All-American high school caliber athlete, it does not matter that you are competing on Arthur Ashe Center\'s 11 laps to a mile track without spikes. As Bethel senior Shakia Forbes and Hampton senior Tierra Brown showed, great athletes can put up great performances on a less than great indoor track at the Green Dragon Relays in Richmond.
Forbes, an All-American in the long jump last June at Nike Outdoor Nationals, won the long jump competition at the Ashe Center with a state leading mark of 18\'4\". While the Seton Hall University bound Forbes has a personal best of 19\'9.75\" outdoors in the event, the Bethel star was only half an inch of her indoor best of 18\'4.50\" from last year.
Brown has ran much faster in the 55 meter hurdles from her winning time of 8.48 on Saturday with a 8.19 clocking in her district meet last year, but her time was good enough for an early season state best. No spikes required for Brown to move to the front of the state leaderboard as she is quite a talent as she has won multiple state championships in the past including a sweep of the hurdles this past June with state titles in the 100 and 300 meter hurdles. However, the All-American 400 meter hurdler has yet to win a state championship indoors for 55 meter hurdles and likely has that on her to do list for this season.
Coach Witherspoon has to be pleased with his jumpers as J.R. Tucker athletes swept the two triple jump events with sophomore Jasia Richardson posting the top mark of 35\'1\" in the girls\' triple jump and senior Marcus Robinson leaping to a winning jump of 45\'1\".
Lafayette senior Anastasia Abid rallied late in the race to pass Norfolk Academy senior Anica Bilisoly in the 1600 meter run with roughly half a second separating the two runners at the finish with Abid clocked in first at 5:24.08 and Bilisoly finishing as race runner-up in 5:42.62.
Two of the top three finishers in the boys\' 1600 meter run happened to be sophomores as the class of 2009 appears to be one of the most promising and deepest classes of distance boys this state has seen in a while as Louisa County\'s Thomas Baker won in 4:41.21 and Kellam\'s Bobby Peavey took third in 4:43.91. Norfolk Academy junior David Rushing split up the two sophomores in second at 4:43.91.