Even with a new runner, Sanford Seminole’s 4x100 relay posts state’s best time
Talk about making a big splash.
Sanford Seminole’s boys 4x100 meter relay team, Class 4A state champs each of the past two seasons, ran the nation’s fifth-fastest time for 2023 on a rain-soaked track in Friday’s Charlie Harris Relays at Lake Brantley High School.
It was the Seminoles’ first varsity 4x100 of the year, and they were without one of their fastest runners, Kansas signee Tyrique Lewis.
Ken Brauman, in his 40th year as Seminole’s head coach, was clearly surprised to see a winning time of 40.72 seconds pop up on his cellphone as he was awaiting the race result.
That is No. 4 on the area’s all-time list behind Olympia’s 40.39 at the 2003 Golden West Invitational in California, Seminole’s 40.57 time to win state last year and Apopka’s 4A championship time of 40.69 in 2012.
“It’s the first time we’ve run this group, and 40.72 is pretty powerful,” Brauman said. “That’s tremendous in these conditions.”
Seniors Amari Turner and Marshae McDonald and sophomore Trarell Beckford — the three sprinters who joined Lewis to run the school-record 40.57 a year ago — were just as surprised as their coach.
“Man, I thought Coach must have meant 41.72,” McDonald said. “I was expecting something like 41.2, but 40.7?
“It was slippery. We’re not used to running in the rain. We just had to focus up, and that’s what we did. That’s why we’re so stoked.”
Jalen Blake, a senior, ran the first 100 in place of Lewis, who said he has been held out since straining a hamstring in his first day of practice after coming off his basketball season.
Edgewater clocked a state top-10 time of 41.59 for second place. But the race was over by the time Turner, who is bound for Harvard, took the baton on the third and final exchange and blazed his way to the finish line.
The performance is No. 1 in
Florida, according to Flrunners.com, ahead of Class 3A powers Miami Northwestern (41.01) and Plantation American Heritage (41.10).
The 4A front-runner before Friday’s Seminole shocker was Vero Beach (41.12).
The top four times on the MileSplit.com U.S. list are Texas teams: Klein Forest (40.21), Fort Bend Marshall (40.43), Cypress Creek (40.57) and Ridge Point (40.71).
Light rain fell before the meet began and again about an hour into the running events, which started at 6 p.m. Competition was paused as athletes and fans sought shelter at the Brantley football stadium when showers increased for a bit.
Events continued just after 7:30 p.m., in time for Seminole to win the junior varsity 4x100 with its promising freshman football quarterback, David Parks, running a leg.
Seminole also won the girls 4x100 (48.36) and boys 4x400 (3 minutes, 19.05 seconds), which ended a meet that began at 4 and concluded after 11:30.
Edgewater turned the tables in the rarely contested 4x200 relay, running 1:28.68 to beat Seminole (1:29.84).
Lake Brantley senior Michael Harris, a Maryland football recruit and the 4A state runner-up in the long jump last year, leaped 21 feet, 2 inches to win that event.
Ocoee senior Dylan Horne won the boys discus with a season-best throw of 168-11. That ranks No. 2 in 4A, as does his 55-3 shot put from earlier in the season.
Lake Mary’s Price Wheeler won the boys 1,600 in 4:25.40.
U’nitee Brown, a key contributor in Winter Springs girls weightlifting state championship three weeks ago, won the girls shot put at 36-9
Edgewater junior Amaya Bien-Aime, a state runner-up in 2022, won the girls high jump with a 5-5 effort that ranks No. 1 in 3A.
Master’s Academy junior Ava Wyant, a 1A region champion and state placer in two events last year, coasted to the girls 1,600 win in a time of 5:13.93 that is well off her personal-best performance (4:53.39).