Glenbard South’s Walker makes father proud
With Elven Walker III watching from the Proviso West bleachers, Elven IV took home a Ist place and a IInd.
“This is the first time my dad’s seen me hurdle,” said the Glenbard South senior. “I had to add a little oomph to it.”
At the 22nd annual Pirate Indoor Classic on Saturday Walker shook a monkey off his back to win the 55-meter hurdles in 7.76 seconds.
“I’ve never really conquered the final this year yet,” he said. “Every time I make it to the finals I always choke, so I had to stop talking about it and be it.”
In the 200 hurdles Walker finished second to East St. Louis’ Marcus Greer by .01 second, making his father prouder still.
“He’s busy working and things like that,” Elven IV said. “He finally found some free time, so he came out to see me.”
Walker also ran the lead leg of a sixth-place 1,600 relay, helping the Raiders place third overall with 83 points at the 22-team meet, the top option to the Illinois Prep Top Times Indoor Classic. East St. Louis (111.5 points) and Homewood-Flossmoor (90.5) claimed the top spots.
The Raiders, third in Class 2A outdoors last year, saw the foursome of Wesley Sanders, Jarius Shannon, Justin Gjerazi and Kenny Anderson fly out of a lower-seeded section to win the 800 relay. Sanders also placed fourth in the 55 dash and returned to win the 200 in 23.02 seconds.
“It motivated me,” Sanders said of his 55 finish, “because when I thought about it I should have did better than how I started off. So I knew I had to pick it up in the 200 and get some points for the team.”
Glenbard North got scoring turns by Jay Alberto in the 600, Jordan Simmons in the 200, Mitch Siver in shot put and Dominic Beljung with a fourth-place mark in pole vault.
A junior co-captain, Siver’s fifth-place finish showed positive progression.
“I started at 44, 45 (feet) at the beginning of the season,” Siver said. “Coming into outdoor I should be throwing upward of 47. I threw 47-3 at this meet, so I should be 48-49 outdoors.”
Competing in its first indoor meet in two years, Immaculate Conception knew it would be challenged. The Knights came closest to scoring in high jump, where James Janowski and Dan Vatch cleared 5 feet, 10 inches and 5-8, respectively.
“The competition here is unbelievable,” said Vatch, a 2011 state qualifier. “We can learn a lot from watching them, and going into conference meets we’ll be able to carry what we learned here into those meets and make us better for the future.”