McCallie senior Hakim McMorris was leaps and bounds ahead of the competition Saturday.
Literally.
McMorris won all four of his events at the McCallie Mid-South Track Classic, winning the long jump (22-0.5), high jump (6-2), 110-meter hurdles (14.72) and 300 hurdles (40.39). The only event involving jumping that McMorris didn't win was the triple jump, and that's because athletes are allowed to compete in only four individual events.
"My goal is to hit 23 in the long jump and hopefully 6-6 in the high jump," McMorris said. "I also have some work to do in the hurdles, and then I'll also be doing the decathlon."
McCallie also defended its home track in the team competition, scoring 169 points, with Oakland from Murfreesboro coming in second with 91. While McMorris might have led the Blue Tornado, he had plenty of help from his teammates.
McCallie's throwers came up huge, scoring 43 points in just two events. Dre Taylor won the shot put (49-10) with Quindarius Dunnigan finishing second and Wyatt Hughes third. In the discus, Patrick Ramey, Dunnigan and Taylor finished second, third, and fourth. Freshman Jack Braman also won the pole vault with a vault of 12 feet.
Other boys' champions from the area were Walker Valley's Zeke Westfield (triple jump), Chattanooga Homeschool's Chase Faudi (1600) and Arts & Science's Brevin Sims (200).
McMorris - who will compete for California-Berkeley next year - won the McIlwaine-Pataky Outstanding Athlete Award for the most individual points scored.
The female award winner was Arts & Science's Alayah Dozier, who won both the 100 (12.41) and 200 (25.51). Even though she is only a sophomore, the rising star has lofty goals for the season.
"I want try to win state in the 100, 200 and 400," Dozier said. "I have specific times I'm working toward, but mainly I just focus on winning each race."
One of the top performances of the day was in the girls' pole vault, where GPS senior Rachel Smith set a meet record with a vault of 11-1.
"Last year I was working on just clearing the bar," Smith said. "This year I have to work on my form because I want to get to 12 (feet). If I want to get to 12, instead of just going up in pole size, I have to learn to turn earlier so I can barely clear it."
Soddy-Daisy senior Mattie Thomas swept the girls' throwing events, winning both the shot put (35-5) and discus (104-1). Other girls' champions from the area were Red Bank's Kimbra Dunning (long jump), GPS's Carley Braman (1600) and Rhea County's Lesley Green (3200).
Fort Payne won the girls' team competition with 86 points.
Contact Kevin Llewallyn at sports@timesfreepress.com.