Rapid City Central's Cole Tucker completed a sweep of the sprints at the PIerre Invitational last week, winning the 100-, 200- and 400-meter dashes, and ran a leg of the Cobblers' winning 400-meter relay team. He was named the most outstanding male athlete for his efforts. Photo by Don Polovich/Journal staff.

Advertisement
Advertise Here	Directory

Athlete of the Week: Cobbler leaves foes Tucker-ed out
By Padraic Duffy, Journal Sports Writer

RAPID CITY - Rapid City Central's Cole Tucker is used to winning races, lots of them actually, just not quite as many as he won last Friday at the Pierre Invitational.

Tucker took firsts in the 100-, 200- and 400-meter races in addition to running for the winning 400-meter relay team to be named the meet's outstanding male athlete. Tucker also set the meet record in the 200, finishing the race in 22 seconds. For that effort Tucker has been named the Rapid City Journal Athlete of the Week.

Heading into the meet Tucker hadn't had a day like his four-win effort since middle school but he had been running quite well this season so he knew that type of performance was a possibility.

"It's always hard to tell. Heading into a meet you want to be confident but not overconfident," Tucker said. "If you're overconfident you won't run as well. I suppose I had an air of confidence about me or whatever, but I didn't really know."

Central head coach Dave Dolan has seen something click in his star sprinter in the last month or so that he has been waiting for. Tucker won the Class AA 400-meter race at last year's state meet in Sioux Falls in a time of 49.5 seconds but his times haven't been quite that fast so far this season.

"Probably one of the biggest turnarounds came when it came out in the paper about that 400 in Sioux Falls," Dolan said of Sioux Falls Lincoln runner Sayfe Jassim's blistering 47.9-second 400-meter time. "Now he knew that there was somebody out there that was looking to dethrone him."

Since that time Dolan has seen a marked improvement in Tucker's work ethic and attitude in practice.

"He's been working very, very hard to improve in the last three weeks," Dolan said. "He's just had a different gear, mentality, and he's doing the extra things to push himself to get down below 50 (seconds). He's kind of worried about that a little bit but training-wise he's ahead of where he was last year."

Still, Tucker definitely knows what's happening in the state's largest city.

"I'm hoping to get my time down there (in the 400) so I can compete a lot better with Jassim," Tucker said. "He's looking pretty well over on the Sioux Falls side."

With Jassim right on top of the state record of 47.8 seconds set by Larry Miller of Freeman Academy Tucker knows that a second state title in the 400 is a long, long way from a given.

"It drives me," Tucker says of knowing how fast he's going to have to run to win another title. "I mean it shows you how committed (Jassim) is, the hard work that he's put in and you've got to respect that, but it makes me want to work just as hard to get there and compete with him."

Everywhere Tucker looks he's got somebody running as fast as anybody in the state ever has. Right in town he duels with Stevens' Cody English in the 100 and 200 seemingly every week and the two of them are routinely down around 10.6 seconds in the 100 and under 23 in the 200.

"It's nice to have somebody like him here in town," Tucker said. "He really pushes me and I get to see him all the time. It's not like running against somebody from Sioux Falls that you only see once or twice a year. He's just right across town."

While Tucker would like to duplicate his performance from Friday in May's state meet he knows that it's going to come down to what is best for his team.

"I'd like to try to run all three," Tucker said of the 100-, 200- and 400-meter races. "But, it's going to come down to what the coaches say."

Dolan says it's definitely a possibility, but that the decision will ultimately be made by the health of the team.

"He's going to run the 200 and 400," Dolan said. "But we're going to have to see with the 100. We've got four relay teams that we could use him on so if something happens with somebody on one of those and we need him, we'll see."

Contact Duffy at 394-8429 or at padraic.duffy@rapidcityjournal.com

Peak performers

Boys track & field

Chas DeMers, Winner

DeMers posted the fastest 400-meter time in the Class A ranks this season with a 49.51-second clocking Saturday at the Chamberlain Invitational. DeMers, who also owns the fastest 100- and 200-meters times in Class A this spring, also won the 100 at Chamberlain with a time of :11.18.

Girls track & field

Stacy Huss, Stanley County

Huss was a four-time winner at the Big Dakota Conference meet held Tuesday, April 19. Huss won the 800-meter run with a time of 2 minutes, 40.3 seconds, the triple jump with a mark of 34 feet, 5-1/2 inches, the long jump with a leap of 14-5 and the 300-meter hurdles with a clocking of :49.07.

Girls golf

Mikala Henzlik, R.C. Stevens

Henzlik, a senior, continued her strong play this spring with a second-place finish at the Huron Invitational. Henzlik was tied with Brookings' Morgan Fitts after 18 holes of regulation. Both golfers shot 8-over-par scores of 80. Fitts claimed medalist honors in a scorecard playoff.

Boys golf

Fred Foland, Philip

Foland came out on top in a four-player, two-hole playoff and claimed first-place honors at the rain-shortened Wall-Philip Invitational played Thursday. Foland was tied with teammate Brit Olson, Bennett County's Scotty Claussen and Andy Ford of Custer after nine holes of play. All four carded scores of 4-over-par 40 at Lake Waggoner Golf Course.

To nominate an athlete to be the Journal's Athlete of the Week or a Peak Performer, e-mail Journal Assistant Sports Editor Jeff Easton at jeff.easton@rapidcityjournal.com