Northville's Abbott Takes Place with Stars
June 4, 2016
By Bill Khan
Special to Second Half
HUDSONVILLE — It was supposed to be the Sekayi Bracey and Anna Jefferson show.
And, to a great extent, it was.
Bracey added two more victories to her resume, finishing her outstanding career at East Kentwood with 10 individual championships in MHSAA track and field meets.
Jefferson led Oak Park to a third straight Lower Peninsula Division 1 team championship and all-division MHSAA Finals records in the 800 and 400 relays. The Knights had 81.5 points, while runner-up Ann Arbor Pioneer had 64.
While Bracey and Jefferson added to their legacies, Northville senior Chloe Abbott upstaged both all-time great Michigan sprinters by beating each of them head-to-head in events they've previously won.
First, Abbott ran 53.10 seconds to take down Jefferson in the 400-meter dash, an event Jefferson won in 2013 and 2014 before taking second in 2015. Jefferson took third Saturday.
Less than an hour later, Abbott pulled off a double that is extremely difficult under most circumstances, but more so considering her primary competition was going for her fourth MHSAA championship in the event. Yet, Abbott charged from behind to win the 200 in 24.03, while Bracey finished fourth in a race that featured six times of 24.51 seconds or faster.
Not yet worn out from those two exhausting races, Abbott anchored Northville to victory in the 1,600 relay, the final event, giving her three victories in the last six races of the day. She was also on the fourth-place 800 relay team, giving her a hand in 35 of third-place Northville's 50 points.
The first thing Abbott did after winning the 400 was try to forget about it.
"I talked to my friends," she said. "I relaxed myself a little bit, kind of numbed myself to the 400 zone. If you think about it for a long time, you're like, 'Wow, I did so good in the 400.' You kind of get comfortable with it. I wanted to forget it and focus on the 200. I'm so glad I was able to pull out another win. I'm surprising myself today."
Abbott didn't have the MHSAA Finals pedigree of Bracey or Jefferson.
In 2013, when Bracey and Jefferson were winning championships as freshmen, Abbott was 27th in the 200, her only event that year. She took sixth in the 100 and ninth in the 200 as a sophomore, while helping Northville get two top-three finishes in relays. As a junior, she was third in the 400 and seventh in the 200, adding a third-place finish on the 1,600 relay.
Abbott didn't beat Jefferson in the 400 until last summer, after the high school season.
"Ever since then, I didn't want to get beat by her again," Abbott said. "So, I kept pushing and knew I could do it."
Abbott had never beaten Bracey until Saturday.
"I never even dreamed of beating Sekayi," Abbott said. "I knew how great she was. She hasn't had a lot of competition all season. I figured she was going to come out and push it today, because she finally has some competition. I was nervous about that, because she's very good. I wanted to make sure I got that out of my head, forget about the people and just focus on my race and what I can control."
Bracey lost in a 200 final only once in her four-year career before Saturday, that coming her freshman year when Rockford's Sammy Cuneo beat her in the Michigan Interscholastic Track Coaches Association Division 1 team championship meet.
"I don't even know what happened," Bracey said. "I was so frustrated when they were all coming up on me. I'm like, 'What's going on?' I never had that in my life. It was confusing."
Abbott and Bracey will be teammates at Purdue University beginning next season.
"I told her, '1 and 2, that's it, because now we're a team,'" Abbott said. "I wanted her and me to show out for Purdue and show out for our schools."
Bracey won the 100 for the fourth straight year in 12.08 seconds. She won her third long jump title with a leap of 18 feet, 10 inches. She jumped only once in the Finals to preserve herself for her track events.
Jefferson helped Oak Park break two all-division Finals records set by Detroit Mumford in 2005 with times of 1:36.66 in the 800 relay and 46.28 in the 400 relay.
"That was special," Oak Park coach Brandon Jiles said. "We knew we could run fast in the 4x1 and 4x2. It was all about putting it on the track. Those times are the fastest times by far that have been run in the state. For those kids to run that fast, they were really rolling. Everything had paid off, the hard work."
The Knights got off to a shaky start, with Jefferson failing to qualify for the championship race in the 100 hurdles and the 3,200 relay team placing out of the scoring with a ninth-place finish.
"It started out tough, but the kids were resilient and they fought and they showed they could win a tight meet, as opposed to a blowout like the last couple of years," Jiles said.
Oak Park's individual champions were sophomore Dorriann Coleman, who took the 800 in 2:10.20, and senior Brianna Holloway, who set a meet record in the 300 hurdles with a time of 42.71.
Greenville junior Landon Kemp was another of the stars of the meet. The highlight of her day was breaking the all-division Finals record in the pole vault with a leap of 13 feet, 4 inches. She also took second in the long jump at 18-5.5 and fifth in the 100 hurdles in 14.87.
Other individual champions were Ann Arbor Pioneer's Britten Bowen in the 100 hurdles (14.08); Port Huron's Rachel Bonner in the 1,600 (4:49.29); Farmington's Maddy Trevisan in the 3,200 (10:35.85); Grand Blanc's Quiara Wheeler in the discus (136-2); Grosse Pointe South's Kayli Johnson in the shot put (44-7.75); and Macomb Dakota's Kayla Dobies in the high jump (5-7).
Ann Arbor Pioneer won the 3,200 relay in 8:56.52.
PHOTOS: (Top) Northville's Chloe Abbott takes the lead on the way to one of her two championships Saturday. (Middle) East Kentwood's Sekayi Bracey won the ninth and 10th individual Finals titles of her career. (Below) Oak Park's 800 relay was among significant contributors to the team's overall LP Division 1 championship. (Photos by Carter Sherline and John Brabbs/RunMichigan.com.)
Summerfield Girls Find Their Stride, Claim 1st League Title Since 1990
By
Doug Donnelly
Special for MHSAA.com
May 20, 2026
David Raymond has heard it before.
“I always laugh because I've definitely gone on the recruiting trail in our hallways and tried to get kids to come out (for track & field), and one of the answers I always get was, ‘I don't even like running.’ I tell them, ‘Great, you'll fit right in because there's a bunch of kids that run track that don't like running.’”
Running track is a little more fun these days, however, at Petersburg Summerfield, where Raymond is the head coach. His Bulldogs recently celebrated winning their first league championship in more than three decades and have a bunch of qualifiers heading into next week’s Lower Peninsula Division 4 Finals.
“When you win, people start talking it up positively within the hallways,” Raymond said. “That helps when you're trying to recruit kids. It's kind of funny how when you win, all of a sudden people are a little bit more interested and want to see what it's all about.”
Raymond is a 1999 Summerfield graduate. He played multiple sports in high school and was part of teams that won District basketball and a Regional track titles his senior year. He was named the Summerfield varsity girls basketball coach at age 23 and eventually switched to become the boys varsity coach. He would coach the Bulldogs for seven seasons, win 100 games, and become the winningest coach in school history before stepping down to spend more time with his family, which includes three daughters.
Two of those daughters are now on the Summerfield varsity track team. Both are headed to the Finals meet next weekend – Abby in the low hurdles and three relays and Grace in the 800 and three relays.
“I'm very blessed to be able to coach my daughters,” Raymond said.
When Grace was a freshman, she was Summerfield’s only Finals qualifier. This year she and Abby lead a parade of nine Bulldogs who have earned a trip.
Grace set a school record in the 800 at Friday’s Regional and was part of the 3,200 relay with her sister, Makenzie Wolfe and Allison Ost that set a school record and qualified as well.
Grace and Abby are part of the Finals-qualifying 400 relay with Emma Jacob and Sophia Stanger and part of the 1,600 relay with Alice VanCamp and Ost. Abby Zilka (high jump), Ost (1600), Wolfe (3200) and Gabi Myshock (discus) are other qualifiers. Abby will also compete in the low hurdles next weekend.
“Having nine girls qualify for the state meet shows how far the program has come over the last 3-5 years,” Raymond said. “It’s been incredible. The team has come a long way. We’ve had good kids come in, obviously. You need talent in order to be successful, and we have that. The girls have worked hard and put the time in. I am thankful they have been able to put it all together this year.”
Winning Summerfield’s first girls Tri-County Conference track championship since 1990 was a pleasant surprise.
“Winning a league title was a different experience for us because a lot of times, we kind of knew going into certain meets we didn’t have a chance,” he said. “Our focus has always been Regionals. This year, we had a much different mindset that we were going to try and win it. The hard work paid off. That’s what was so exciting.”
While he ran on the track team in high school, he didn’t start coaching the sport until about five years ago as an unofficial assistant to the previous head coach, Kelly Thompson. She stepped away from the head coaching role when her son started running in college. He has surrounded himself with several great assistants, he said, including two classmates from high school.
“There was an opening, and it was an opportunity for me to, again, be with my kids a little bit more, and that's kind of how I ended up in the role,” he said. “I learned that track is not a sport where you can coach by yourself; you need quality people around you.”
Raymond decided he wanted to be a teacher and coach in high school.
“I had good coaches growing up,” he said. “Ron Estes was my varsity basketball coach when I decided to go into teaching. I had a number of people like him that influenced me and showed me that teaching can be a great career and, when you get the opportunity, to coach.
“I've obviously loved sports my entire life. At first coaching was a way to be around sports. As you grow older, you start to see the impact that you can have on kids, which is even different than what the impact that you can have on somebody in a classroom is. It's always been an avenue that has allowed me to impact kids in a positive way.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a news and sports reporter at the Adrian Daily Telegram and the Monroe News for 30 years, including 10 years as city editor in Monroe. He's written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. He is now publisher and editor of The Blissfield Advance, a weekly newspaper. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Petersburg Summerfield coach David Raymond encourages Allison Ost during a relay race this season. (Middle) Summerfield 1,600 relay racers (left to right) Abby Raymond, Alice Van Camp and Ost get together to “Triple A Power Up.” (Below) Grace Raymond (left) and Abby Raymond hold up Summerfield's first league title trophy won since 1990. (Photos by Tom Westrick.)