VHSL Group AAA State Meet Coverage

VHSL Group AAA State Outdoor T&F Championships
MileSplit Staff

Thigpen repeats as 300H, sets up for three peat in 2009

Stonewall Jackson junior Damien Thigpen won the 300 meter hurdles state championship at the AAA State Meet for the second year in a row and with one of the fastest times ever in the meet's history at 37.04. Thigpen has set himself up to make history next year if he can become a three-time state champion in the event and also go after the the 1984 meet record of 36.50. (Photo by Ted Plunkett)

Dramatic finish in finals of girls 300H!

Brittany Hyter of Osbourn Park and Taylor Wheaton of Landstown went into the final hurdle almost even, but Wheaton clipped the last hurdle and fell to the track while Hyter was able to get her body across the line first in a stellar time of 42.76. Wheaton was able to recover quick enough to get back up for fourth place. (Photo by Ted Plunkett)

Landstown becomes first team ever to win all three relays

Their 4x800 meter relay win was a shocker on Friday, their 4x100 meter relay win was dominating earlier on Saturday, and their 4x400 meter relay was history making to close out the meet on Saturday. The Booker T. Washington girls made them work all four legs and down to the wire, but the Landstown girls were able to win with a strong time for a relay which did not even include Marlena Wesh in 3:47.92. Landstown became the first team ever in the history of the meet to win all three relays in the 4x800, 4x100, and 4x400 meter relays (Photo by Ted Plunkett)

The Landstown girls put on arguably the most dominating team performance in the history of a VHSL Group AAA State Outdoor Track and Field Championships. Their team score of 94 points in the 2008 state championships tied an all-time meet record with the 1984 Lake Braddock squad. The Lady Eagles became the first team ever to win all three relay events at the state meet as it was all possible thanks to a huge upset win the 4x800 meter relay on Friday. It could have been even more dominating than it ended up as their top two hurdlers Taylor Wheaton and Olivia Hutchins both fell in a hurdle race each in Saturday's finals as Wheaton went from a possible state title to fourth after clipping the final hurdle in the 300 meter hurdles. WIth their win on Saturday, the Landstown girls made it a clean sweep of the state track titles in the 2008 after walking victorious from George Mason University in March for the indoor championships.

The relay trifecta required the Landstown girls to develop one of their top 400 meter sprinters into being ready to run a leg on the 4x800 meter relay and also increasing their depth at 400 meters of more than four girls to be able to run well under 60 seconds in the quarter since their top athlete Marlena Wesh would be maxed out at three running events with the 200 meter dash finals. Kelnesha Hinnant has been one of the state's top quarter milers in the state over the past year, but she often is third on the depth chart in the event. The coaching staff must have saw the potential in the indoor season for Hinnant to run strong for another 300 meters after running a time of 1:15 in the 500 meter dash. Her 2:19 opening leg in Friday's 4x800 meter relay put them in the race and her teammates kept them in it then pulled out the win in 9:19.42.

The door definitely opened up for Landstown and other teams in the race with the teams always expected to compete for the 4x800 state title in Westfield and Midlothian both dealing with great adversity. Midlothian was stuck in the slow section as their 9:30 season best time was not fast enough to get into this year's fast section, while Westfield had injuries to two key legs on their "A" team in Kerry Hartman and Emani Ban to prevent them from putting a team at full strength on the track.

Friday could not have gone any better for Landstown as they had the fastest qualifier in all of the laned events contesting prelims on day one with the exception of the 100 meter hurdles. Leading the charge on day one and then again on day two was junior Marlena Wesh, who was arguably the most unchallenged athlete all weekend as she simply ran away from the competition in both of her prelim and final races in the 100 and 200 meter dash as well as on her anchor leg in the 4x100 meter relay. Wesh was running times not far off of the state meet records despite running in 1/8 inch spikes due to the spike limitations at Todd Stadium with her clockings of 11.86 in the 100 and 23.97 in the 200 meter dashes to win both events quite convincingly.

Cierra McGee was the star of Landstown's sprint crew before Wesh's emergence over the past year. She has had to deal with the attention especially media attention being focused on Wesh instead of her. She got back on top on Saturday though and played a big role in her team's state title run in winning her first state championship since her sophomore year at the outdoor state meet when she took the 200 meter dash state title in 2006. The UNC bound senior claimed the 400 meter state title and won with her fastest time ever at 55.05. She was relied on at the end of the meet to come through as well on anchor leg of the 4x400 meter relay as her team was battling back and forth with Booker T. Washington throughout. She took the lead away from Booker T. Washington's Raven Wilson on the back stretch and then was able to hold off a late comeback by Wilson to help the Landstown girls finish with a remarkable time of 3:47 despite not using Wesh as one of their legs and also come through in allowing her team to be the first school ever to win all three relay races at the state meet.

After coming up just short in a sweep of the indoor and outdoor titles last year in a narrow loss to Deep Creek at the 2007 VHSL Group AAA State Outdoor Championships, the Western Branch boys were determined to not let up this spring and especially at Todd Stadium for the outdoor state meet. While the relays were a cornerstone of the Western Branch boys title runs in 2007 and the Landstown girls this year, a trio of individual performers were really the difference makers for the Bruins in 2008. Jeffrey Artis was the most versatile athlete for Western Branch coach Claude Toukene as he was called on to run in both hurdle races, run a leg on their 4x100 meter relay, and  compete in the long jump and triple jump. Artis scored in four events with his best finishing coming in a runner-up finish to teammate Kevin Newsome in the 110 meter hurdles.

Newsome's cousin and teammate Torry Womack had the most impressive meet out of all Western Branch athletes as his closing speed was remarkable in the finals for the both the 100 and 200 meter dash to run down Keith Ricks of King's Fork, who had great starts and showings in each race with times of 10.85 and 21.60 respectively. Ricks was not to able to get a good enough headstart to hold off Womack, who clocked in at 10.81 in the 100 meter dash finals and a 21.59 thriller photo finish victory over Ricks in the 200.

VHSL GROUP AAA STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS MEET PAGE:

 

2008 VHSL Group AAA State Outdoor T&F Champions

Boys Event Girls
Albemarle
7:49.55		 4x800m Relay Landstown
9:19.42
Kevin Newsome
(Western Branch)
14.15		 110/100m Hurdles Charisse Bryant
(Green Run)
14.18
Torry Womack
(Western Branch)
10.81		 100m Dash

Marlena Wesh
(Landstown)
11.86
Joe Lorusso
(Oakton)
4:13.38		 1600m Run Tasia Potasinski
(Westfield)
4:56.75
Nansemond River
41.77		 4x100m Relay Landstown
46.51
Javell Bullard
(Bethel)
47.60		 400m Dash Cierra McGee
(Landstown)
55.05
Damien Thigpen
(Stonewall Jackson)
37.04		 300m Hurdles Brittany Hyter
(Osbourn Park)
42.76
Eric Hoepker
(Battlefield)
1:54.07		 800m Run Amanda Smith
(Grassfield)
2:15.82
Torry Womack
(Western Branch)
21.59		 200m Dash Marlena Wesh
(Landstown)
23.97
Jason Witt
(Midlothian)
9:17.46		 3200m Run Hiruni Wijayaratne
(Herndon)
11:00.23
Bethel
3:15.71		 4x400m Relay Landstown
3:47.92
Allen Kelly
(King's Fork)
14-09.00		 Pole Vault Emma Dejarnette
(Atlee)
12-00.00
Chris Copeland
(Lakeland)
6-10.00		 High Jump

DeShana Briggs
(Booker T. Washington)
5-08.00
Wesley Smith
(Oscar Smith)
24-07.00		 Long Jump Tiffany Harris
(Churchland)
18-11.25

David Wilson
(George Washington)
49-11.00

 Triple Jump

Briana Hudson
(Deep Run)
39-5.75

Frede Spellman
(Oscar Smith
57-00.00

 Shot Put Kayla Lewis
(William Fleming)
40-03.75

Frank Afriye
(T.C. Williams)
168-04.00

 Discus

Christianna Moss
(Patrick Henry)
129-07.00
Western Branch
62 points		 Team Champions Landstown
94 points