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State Athletes Overcome Barriers - Updates to 2023 CT Outdoor Track and Field RecordsPublished by
By Ron Knapp, Owner, Editor, Photographer, mysportsresults@gmail.com Track and field athletes are always competing against the clock or the tape as well as each other. Ability doesn’t always result in winning but the addition of desire, motivation and a fearless attitude can lead to discovering new limits. State athletes discovered new limits in the 2023 outdoor track and field season; we saw four all-time Connecticut records and 16 CIAC State Championship (Open and Class) meet records broken or tied. In an extraordinary concurrence of events, the four state records all involved the act of hurdling a barrier, whether it was a standard hurdle or a steeplechase barrier. We hope you enjoy the following review of the latest records provided as a courtesy to our readers. Connecticut State High School Outdoor Track and Field Records Joshua Mooney, Stonington, 110m Hurdles Stonington’s Josh Mooney created history just about every time he stepped on the track. He already set the state record indoors in the 55m hurdles and 60m hurdles plus the New England record of 13:58 in the 110m hurdles. On Sunday after several callbacks at the New Balance Nationals Outdoor 110m Championship race Mooney was solidly behind going over the first few hurdles but his consistent clearance over each barrier allowed him to move into the lead over the last two hurdles. The UConn committed athlete raced into a slight .9 headwind and crossed the line in a new Connecticut and New England record of 13.48. His time is also tied for the 7th fastest time for the entire country in 2023.
Soheib Dissa, Newtown, 2k Steeplechase On Friday at the New Balance Nationals Outdoor meet, severe weather in the early afternoon forced a four hour delay that pushed the evening's steeplechase championship races to start after 11:00pm. The delay didn’t seem to affect Newtown sophomore Soheib Dissa, the State Open 1600m runner-up and 3000m steeplechase champion, as he dueled for the lead with NY steeplechase champion Solomon Holden-Betts. The valiant effort by Dissa came up short as he placed third in 5:51.34 to earn All-American honors and a place in the Connecticut record book. Dissa eclipsed the former time of 5:58.55 by Matthew Chisholm set in 2014 at the New Balance Nationals. In previous weeks Dissa had set his personal bests in the 800m of 1:52.65 at the Loucks Games in early May and later finished the 1-mile in 4:10.07 for a second place at the New England Championships.
Photo Courtesy of John Nepolitan Katherine Bohlke, Newington, 2k Steeplechase No matter what meet management did to save time, the girl’s 2000m steeple still didn’t go off until just after midnight. That didn’t seem to bother New England 1600m champion Katherine Bohlke of Newington who steadily moved up the entire race and finished in 4th place, six places higher than last year. Her time of 6:42.20 shattered Jackie Nicholas’ 12-year old state record of 6:52.64. Earlier in the season, Bohlke had set her 5k best at 17:44.43, the 15th fastest time in state history which was followed by her personal records of 10:38.89 in the 3200m and later a 4:53.42 in the mile in the span of 6 days in the middle of May.
Photo Courtesy of John Nepolitan Leonaya Knox, Hillhouse, 100m Hurdles When Babe Ruth pointed to the stands in Game 3 of the 1932 World Series and then hit a home run in the exact same area, it became known as the moment Ruth “called his shot”. Just like the Great Bambino, Hillhouse junior Leonaya Knox’s Twitter post on March 12th stated that she would be the first Connecticut girl to run faster than 14-seconds in the 100m hurdles. She accomplished her goal with a final time of 13.95 on Monday at the SCC East Sectional meet at North Haven High breaking the former state record of 14.16 by Keshia Haughton and Bridget Chiaravalle. Knox continued her undefeated season with wins in the SCC (14.72), CIAC Class MM (14.29) and CIAC State Open (14.01) championships. She capped her season with an All American 6th place finish at the adidas Outdoor Nationals in 14.18.
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CIAC Class and State Open Championship Meet Records The following is a brief recap of the outdoor track and field records set at the State Open, Class LL, L, MM, M and S championship meets in the 2023 outdoor track and field season. CIAC State Open Championships, June 5, 2023 If there was going to be an MVP in the boys State Open championship, there is no doubt that honor would be awarded to Stonington’s Joshua Mooney. The athlete accomplished what only some of the all time greatest athletes in Connecticut history have done - he won three individual gold medals at the State Open and he did it in convincing fashion. Leonaya Knox is more than just the next in a long line of great Hillhouse hurdlers, she is the greatest hurdler to ever come out of Connecticut She announced on Twitter she was going to be the first Connecticut girl to ever go under 14-seconds in the 100m hurdles and then she did it at the SCC East Championships. Since then all Knox has done is broken the Class MM record in the hurdlers and now she can lay claim to the State Open record as well. Knox’s time of 14.01 surpassed Keshia Haughton and Bridget Chiaravalle’s record of 14.16. To top it off she also took 4th in the 100m finals and ran a leg of her school’s 6th place 4x100m relay. What a championship season for the Bloomfield team that was led by senior Laniyah Henderson. After her winning performance at the 91st Greater Hartford Invite that saw her leap 39-9.75 for a personal record and a CT #2 all time, Henderson remained undefeated where she capped her season with a 39-3.5 effort to tie the State Open record set by Nicole Toney in 1999. Dylan Sheehan of Lyme Old Lyme exceeded expectations on the last throw of the finals of the CIAC Hammer Championships on June 12th with a meet record toss of 206-7 that smashed the former meet record of 201-7 set last year by Gary Moore Jr of Hillhouse. The Bates College bound senior is a prime example of what can be achieved with hard work and determination as he rose from a best of 170-2 in 2022 to capping his 2023 season with a 9th place place toss of 195-9 at the New Balance Nationals and US#5 ranking. 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Boys-Open 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Girls-Open CIAC Class LL Meet, May 31st, 2023 The Conard girls first Class LL championship title was powered by a win iIn the 800m by Liv Sherry as she set one of three meet records on the day as she sped to a quick PR of 2:11.78 to erase the former time of 2:12.71 set by Emil Philippides of Greenwich at the 2018 meet. The second meet record was achieved by Conard’s Audrey Kirkutis as she cleared 5-8 to tie the meet standard set by Allyson Lewis of NFA in 2018. Her leap is a CT#1 this season and a personal best by 1-inch which she set last year at the New England and NBNO meets. The ongoing confrontations between state leader Gianluca Bianchi of Greenwich and Hall’s Jonathan York and Samual Sandler reached its apex in the 400m as Bianchi recorded the final meet record of the day. The final heat of the event resulted in a time of 47.84 for Bianchi as he lowered the previous record of 47.99 by Raphael-Andre Ray of Staples in 2011. More remarkable was that the following 4 places resulted in PRs for each runner with York at 48.11, Sandler at 48.99, Greenwich’s Harrison Goldenberg at 49.41 and East Hartford’s Jayden Brown at 49.79. 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Boys-LL 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Girls-LL CIAC Class L Meet, May 31, 2023 The Windsor girls march to their ninth Class L title was powered by their sprinters as they took 13 places in five events 400m or less led by Victoria Francis sweep of the 400m (57.60) and 200m (25.23) titles. Francis returned for an encore in the 4x400m where she was joined by Brittani Westberry, Tahjae Daley and Kareema McKenzie as they set a meet record of 3:52.77 that blew away their previous meet record of 3:54.33 set in 2010. 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Boys-L 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Girls-L CIAC Class M Meet, May 30, 2023 The meets only triple event victor in the individual events was Stonington’s Josh Mooney as he set two meet records in both hurdle events and won the javelin with a toss of 182-0. Mooney’s first meet record came in the 110m hurdles where he finished with the fastest qualifying time of 13.95 that eclipsed Michael Johnson’s meet standard of 14.35 from last year. In the finals of the 110m hurdles, Mooney again lowered his time to a 13.90 as Johnson finished second in 14.56. Mooney returned in the 300m hurdles, speeding to a meet record time of 38.42 that lowered the 2012 mark of 36.68 set by Dan Santalla of Northwestern. 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Boys-M 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Girls-M CIAC Class MM Meet, June 1, 2023 Hillhouse’s Leonaya Knox has already become the first girl in Connecticut history to break 14-seconds for the 100m hurdles when she ran 13.95 at the SCC East Sectional just over three weeks ago. The junior put her name on another record book when she ran 14.29 to break Keshia Haughton’s Class MM record of 14.53 she had held for 24 years. In the girls pole vault, Bethel’s Talia Graham has made steady, if not spectacular progress.She had a season best of 8-0 indoors her freshman year and has continued to vault higher until she cleared a PR of 11'-6 to win the Class MM title last year. A year later, the junior moved the bar up to 12-0 and cleared it on her first attempt to claim another title. Knox and Graham were also involved in another meet record performance as they finished behind Ellington’s Jalena Martin who won the finals of the 100m dash in 12.32 to tie the class record set by Nonnewaug’s Michaela Pernell in 2013. Martin would later finish second in the State Open with a wind-aided 12.15 effort. With so many quality sprinters, Windsor was most impressive in the relays. With the meet well in hand, the Warriors put an exclamation mark on their victory by not only winning the 4x400m, but breaking Hillhouse’s five year old meet record. Grant Harris split a 50.9, and Maxim Copeland blew it open with a 49.3 leg, Taeshawn Berry (51.3) and Hunter Howard (49.4) closed it out as the team ran a time of 3:21.01. The second event of the day saw a tight battle between EO Smith and East Lyme in the 4x800m. The Panthers came in as the defending champion with two of the runners from last year’s team returning. Gabriel Montoya, Jacob Robinson-Smey and Brendan Cook were always either in the lead or a few meters off and handed off to junior Jack Mattingly, the anchor of last year's team as well. This time he matched up very evenly with Viking anchor Brendan Fant and the pair battled it out for the first 550 meters until Mattingly was able to pull away and being pushed to a new meet record of 8:00.60 Fans of the 800m witnessed a great battle with Mattingly setting a strong early pace as he likes to do with Jack Mulcunry of Bristol Eastern and sophomore Thomas Conklin of Lyman Hall right in the slipstream the entire way. After going through the 600m mark in about 1:24, Mulcunry took over the lead breaking the Class MM record with a time of 1:53.43. Remarkably Conklin’s 1:53.55 and Mattingly’s 1:54.70 also went under the 11-year old meet record of 1:54.95 by Thomas Lupoli of Sheehan’s as well. 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Boys-MM 2023 CT-Records-Outdoor-Girls-MM
Check out all of the latest CIAC Outdoor and Indoor Championships records as well as the State Records on our Records page. More news |
