Mingus Union will be represented by 13 students at the Arizona Interscholastic Association state track and field championships this year on Friday and Saturday, May 16 and 17, including Witten Armstrong, who has made the state finals for his third year. Armstrong will be competing in pole vaulting, 110-meter hurdles and 300-meter hurdles. He said that he has been “working on the fine details” in the days before the event, with the goal of achieving16 feet in pole vaulting, a time below 15 seconds in the 110-meter hurdles and a time below 41seconds in the 300-meter hurdles. “I know it sounds cliche but stick to it and keep working hard. It really pays off,” Armstrong said.
“So we have our distance kids working on bringing their distance up a little bit more, bringing their volume up a little bit more,” Coach Aaron Midkiff said of the team’s preparation. “Same for our sprinters, we try to start off with real short sprints at the beginning of season and then just get our top speed nailed. And then from there start lengthening those out. So if a kid is going to run the 400-meterdash, they’re going to run a lot of like 50-meter dash, 100-meter dash, maybe some 200s but not a lot of 400s, and they’ll start getting that top speed up and then they’ll start lengthening right up towards state so they peak right at the end.” He added, “We just tell them, they’ve made it here for a reason, because they are one of the top athletes in the state and that they just got to do their best to flush out all the distractions, all the stressors, that are not related to the event they are doing,” Midkiff said on stress management.
Other students competing in the state championships include Anslie Bliss in Girls High Jump, Cambri Goff in Girls 100m Hurdles and Triple Jump, Cera Hoggard in Girls Discus, Jaylynn Briseno in Girls Long Jump and Triple Jump, Karstyn Richardson and Maddie Babcock in Girls 400m dash, Mica Altringer in Girls 1600m and 3200m run, Quinn Wright in Girls pole vault.
For boys we have Elijah Odell-Wall in Boys High Jump, Javan Sutter in Boys 400m Dash, and Ryan Hoggard in Boys Discuss and Shot put.
