Record Throws Set Up Carson City-Crystal's Soar to 1st Title
By
Will Kennedy
Special for Second Half
June 5, 2021
HUDSONVILLE —For the first time in school history, the Carson City-Crystal Eagles boys track & field team has claimed the title of state champion.
Carson City-Crystal finished Saturday’s Lower Peninsula Division 4 Finals with 68.5 points, 10.5 more than the closest competitor. The Eagles did it with a small group – only eight athletes travelled to Hudsonville to compete. But by the end of the day, all of them had earned the title of all-state athlete.
Junior Zane Forist got the day started off on the right foot in the field events. He won the discus with a throw of 196-5, nearly 60 feet more than the second-place finisher. He also won the shot put with a hurl of 62-4, over 14 feet more than anybody else.
Both were meet records – the discus toss breaking the 190-0 throw by Litchfield’s Jacob Patrick in 2012. The shot put bested the former LPD4 record of 58-5.25 by Ottawa Lake Whiteford’s George Flanner in 2007. And together gave Carson City-Crystal a comfortable lead heading into the track finals, helping alleviate the pressure on the rest of the team.
“When you have the number one thrower, that kind of helps,” said Eagles coach Grant Woodman. “The field events set the tone, and then we let our distance guys ease into it and it just works out for us.”
The distance runners did what they had to do to get the job done. Senior Coleman Clark earned second place in the 1,600 and the top spot in the 3,200. Those points helped keep Saugatuck at bay and put the Eagles firmly atop the podium.
Clark said that in other years, he focused on his individual performance. But this time around, he knew he wanted to give it his all for the overall team victory.
“This year, going into the season knowing we would have a top team, I knew I was going to be team-focused,” Clark said. “It feels so good to hit that top goal as a team. We knew we could do it.”
Jaylin Townsend from Flint Beecher set the standard in sprint events. He came away with an individual title in the 100 with a personal record time of 10.98 and edged Saugatuck’s Benny Diaz for first in the 200 with a time of 22.75. Townsend also helped lead the Buccaneers to a title in the 800 relay with a school record of 1:30.59.
The sophomore said that when he crossed the finish line as a Finals champion for the first time, he got excited realizing he was among the elite of the elite runners in Michigan.
“It feels great,” Townsend said. “I’m always thinking that I have to win, I have to win. … The excitement through my head is just so crazy. Only a couple people can really be state champions, and I’m one of them.”
Diaz earned two individual titles himself, in the 110 hurdles with a time of 14.77 and in the 300 hurdles, crossing the line in 39.59.
While all the excitement was taking place on the track, Wyoming Potter’s House Christian junior Jok Nhial finished first in the long jump with an incredible leap of 21-09.50, a personal record. He shattered his previous PR by seven inches, something he wasn’t expecting to do Saturday.
“It feels amazing that I’m able to do this at the state championship,” Nhial said. “I didn’t expect to make a PR today, or even break our school record. It was a great moment. I’ve worked so hard and for this to be the outcome, it feels great.”
But the true triumph of the day belonged to Carson City-Crystal. The eight athletes and the coaching staff were able to put together a season that none of them will soon forget.
“Everybody stepped up and did their part,” Forist said. “It really is a team thing. It wasn’t just a one-man show. Everybody did their thing. It’s so awesome.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Carson City-Crystal celebrates its first MHSAA Finals championship in track & field. (Middle) Flint Beecher's Jaylin Townsend, right, races Saugatuck's Benny Diaz. (Below) The Eagles' Coleman Clark races in the 3,200. (Photos by Will Kennedy.)
Chippewa Valley's Heard Has Big Plans to Add to All-Time Sprint Legacy
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
May 10, 2024
CLINTON TOWNSHIP — Clinton Township Chippewa Valley senior Shamar Heard admits he’s thought about it, and for good reason.
After all, why not at least entertain the thought of doing something unprecedented in state history when it comes to track & field?
Two years ago as a sophomore, Heard achieved the double in the fastest races, winning both the 100 and 200-meter dashes at the Lower Peninsula Division 1 Finals.
Last year, Heard completed the trifecta when it came to sprint state titles, focusing solely on the 400 dash and winning that event in 47.78 seconds while also running on first and third-place relays.
So, how about trying to train for and win all three events this year as a senior? Who in the state would be able to stop him?
“I definitely have been thinking about it,” Heard said. “Because why not? It probably hasn’t been done in a long time, if ever.”
But while the thought has crossed his mind, it won’t happen. It’s a little much on the body — in particular running the 100-meter dash — to try and do all three at once.
However, Heard in the coming weeks is still in a good position to cement what already is a place among the greatest sprinters to come through the state of Michigan.
First, he has big things in mind for his specialty race, the 400 meters. He has won two consecutive AAU national titles in that event in addition to the Finals title he won last year, but is craving more.
“I want to be at 45 seconds for the state meet,” Heard said noting the June 1 Finals at East Kentwood.
In addition, Heard plans on competing in the 200 meters at East Kentwood. He also is a part of Chippewa Valley’s 800 relay team that won last year in 1:26.41. He’s expected to qualify for all three at the Regional on May 17 at Romeo.
When Heard is done with high school, he will continue running track at Tennessee.
It’s all mighty impressive for a speedster that Chippewa Valley head coach Terry Wilson said hates lifting weights and is “barely above 150 pounds.”
“He doesn’t weigh a whole lot, but he generates a lot of power,” Wilson said. “His strength-to-weight ratio has to be astronomical. He’s just gotten better with his form.”
Throughout his entire life, Heard said he’s simply loved racing. When he was a kid, he would constantly pick out a stop sign on a street or another spot in a yard and race others to the finish, often beating them with ease.
When he was 10 years old, he was invited by a friend to come out for a track team, and he proceeded to beat others in races continuously.
As he got a little older, Heard discovered how gifted he was running the 400 meters and started to focus more on that event.
Heard said he loves the 400 meters so much mostly because he loves embracing a challenge many sprinters don’t want to face.
“I like that not many people want to go through that pain,” he said. “I take it as a compliment when people look at (the 400) and they say, ‘Hey, people are crazy for doing that.’ That makes me motivated to do it.”
Wilson admits there doesn’t have to be much coaching done with Heard. It’s just simply a matter of getting together before races to discuss how he feels and what his body can do that day.
“He understands his body a little bit better every year,” Wilson said. “He understands what he needs to get done in races. He’ll run the 200 in practice and I’ll have a stopwatch on him, and he’ll say, ‘That felt like a 24 (seconds). I look at my stopwatch and it’s a 24.2. He has that ability to gauge how fast he’s going. It’s just different with him.”
Heard also was a football player at Chippewa Valley, but gave the sport up before last fall to focus solely on his track career.
“I was just looking at the bigger picture,” Heard said. “I was more consistent in one sport than I was the other.”
He will run the 400 meters at Tennessee, and then the sky could be the limit given what he’s accomplished already on a national level.
Until then though, Heard will spend the rest of his high school career trying to win more hardware and leave a mark that might be impossible for future sprinters in Michigan to surpass.
“I want to give everyone a senior year that they will remember,” Heard said. “I want to go out with one of the most memorable years of a high school athlete.”
Keith Dunlap has served in Detroit-area sports media for more than two decades, including as a sportswriter at the Oakland Press from 2001-16 primarily covering high school sports but also college and professional teams. His bylines also have appeared in USA Today, the Washington Post, the Detroit Free Press, the Houston Chronicle and the Boston Globe. He served as the administrator for the Oakland Activities Association’s website from 2017-2020. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Chippewa Valley’s Shamar Heard crosses the finish line while anchoring the winning 800 relay at last year’s LPD1 Finals. (Middle) Heard prepares to run the winning 400 at last season’s championship meet. (Click for more from RunMichigan.com.)